Podcasts about modern christians

God's law encompasses three distinct categories: ritual laws fulfilled through Christ's sacrifice, civil laws that governed ancient Israel, and moral laws that remain relevant for believers today. These laws serve as spiritual guardrails, establishing clear standards for holy living and revealing humanity's inherent sinfulness and need for salvation. Just as traffic laws protect drivers, God's law provides protective boundaries for life.While no human except Jesus could perfectly keep God's law, this reality points to our need for salvation through Christ rather than through rule-following. The law was never intended as a means of salvation but as a guide to understanding God's character and our need for a Savior. Modern Christians are called to study these laws not as burdensome restrictions but as loving guidance, applying moral principles while understanding that ritual requirements have been fulfilled through Jesus's sacrifice.Like, comment, & subscribe to stay updated with the latest content! CONNECT WITH US:► Instagram https://www.instagram.com/gccws_gram► Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/gccws ► Website: http://www.gccws.netOUR RESOURCES:►Recharge Devotional: http://www.gccws.net/recharge ►Online Church: http://live.gccws.net ►Online Bulletin: http://www.gccws.net/bulletin ►Discipleship Classes: http://www.gccws.net/adults ►Events Coming Up: http://www.gccws.net/events

Understanding context; Nature of man and God; (Tree of) Knowledge?; What is true?; Information sources; (Dis)respecter of persons; Holy Spirit; Enoch?; Abraham's vision; Rivers in Genesis; Furnace and burning lamp; Caudrons in cities of blood; Welfare snares; Becoming merchandise; No coveting!; Gen 15:6; Learning from our mistakes; Seeking kingdom of God; Government of, for and by the people; Man and woman; Gen 16:1; Sarah and Haggar; "handmaid"; shin-pi-chet-hay+kuf; Who was Hagar?; Freewill offerings only; Haran; Put to death; Terah and Nimrod; Idolatry; "Pure Religion"; Turtledove goddess of Sumer; Bondage of Egypt; Altars of sacrifice; Gen 16:2; Respecting Sarai; Importance of children; Population collapse?; Lessons to be learned; kuy-lamad-lamad+tav (despise); Hagar left; Destroying the character of society; Duty?; Serving one another; Temptation of oppression; ayin-nun-tav (humbly submit); tav-hey-tav (to her authority); Modern Christians not knowing the Lord; Civil corban; Setting the captive free; Learning to do your duty; Ishmael; Serving without benefit; Kadesh and Bered; Hagar's vision; Muslims; Artificial duty; "Kadesh" = homosexual; Oppression of women; Knowing Holy Spirit; Ministering for God; 70% on welfare? Duty to fellowman; Being Israel; Public religion; Public school?; Repentance; Doing what Christ said to do; Covetous practices; God's judgment; Linking Gen 16 to Christ; Two witnesses; Willingness to see yourself; Fleeing Holy Spirit; "Beerlahairoi" (0883); "was called" kuf-resh-aleph - redemptive; biet-aleph-resh (Beer) lamad-heh-yod (lahai) resh-aleph-yod (roi); Hagar going back to serve Sarai; Dying on a cross; Testing your forgiveness; Aleph = relationship of God and man; Yod = divine spark; Awakening of leaders; Returning to God; Sin of Sodom; Strengthening the poor; Caring for one another; Leaven; Freewill vs force; Presidential salvation?; Charity; Are you ready for truth?; To whom do you serve?; Trust Holy Spirit.

Modern Christians are regularly told that they must be empathetic and accommodating if they want to properly represent their faith, but is this really what God called us to? Pastor Joe Rigney joins me to discuss his new book, "The Sin of Empathy: Compassion and Its Counterfeits," and how emotional blackmail is being used to control Christians while driving them away from true biblical compassion. Follow on: Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-auron-macintyre-show/id1657770114 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3S6z4LBs8Fi7COupy7YYuM?si=4d9662cb34d148af Substack: https://auronmacintyre.substack.com/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/AuronMacintyre Gab: https://gab.com/AuronMacIntyre YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/c/AuronMacIntyre Rumble: https://rumble.com/c/c-390155 Odysee: https://odysee.com/@AuronMacIntyre:f Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/auronmacintyre/ Today's sponsors: Follow https://x.com/WillHild Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

By Richard Kennebeck - Jude warned Christians of his day about various problems creeping into the chruch as it approached the 90s AD. These warning are a messgae for us today also as we approach the end time. We must be watchful for these same attitudes so we don't fall into sin.

God's Training Manual for Modern Christians - Steve Bateman - Vineyard 61 Church by Vineyard 61 Church

(An Approach to Church Organization) Kingdom preached by Christ; At hand, for the living; Christ's doctrines; What the early Church was doing; Personality; Switched at birth story; Church Organization; Taking kingdom from Pharisees and appointment to Apostles; Pilate - procurator of Rome; Pilate's proclamation; Old testament "charity"; Servant leaders; Tens, hundreds and thousands; Levites; Perfect Law of Liberty; Incentive for ministers; Helping neighbors succeed; Mark of the Beast; "Cash"; Covetousness; Christ agreeing with Moses; One Church established by Christ; Conforming to Christ; Redefining words; Translational context; Analyzing error; Misinterpretation; Why we congregate; Biblical "study"; Church "nuts and bolts"; Flowcharting The Church?; "Church"; Free assemblies; Types of ministers; Multiple meanings of words; Jubilee; Bank capabilities; Debt forgiveness?; Inflation; Property tax; Legal title; Covetous practices; Repentance; Caring for neighbors; "Visiting" the needy; Religious orders; Church government; Voluntaryism; Armies; Rights from God; Right to make choices; Home schooling; Governing yourselves; Have you repented yet?; Playing church; Religious Order trade or business; Vow of poverty; Following foolish Pharisees; Property owned in common; Jews accepting Jesus; Modern church; vs Church government; Egyptian bondage; Casting bread upon the waters; Fire-assistance example; Flow of contributions through the structure; Kings and priests; Anarchists?; Order of Melchizedek; "Righteous king"; God-allowed governments; Ps 110:4; "word" + hey; Record; Heb 5:6; "taxis"; Body/blood example: network; Being under tribute; Heb 7:17; Kingdom vs congregation; Changing your heart and mind; "Minister"; Who does the minister work for?; Who ordains ministers?; Witness; Choice of giving; Minister functions; Office of minister?; "Corporation sole"; Levites by adoption; Brotherhood under one father; One accord; Recognizing need; Confiscating Church property; Peace. (An Approach to Church Organization (continued)) First Century Church; Modern Christians resemble Pharisees; Are we right?; Jews accepting Christ; Caring for the needy of society; Modern church concerns; Is there grace for you?; Grace = charity; "thank"; "scribes"; Acts 6 organizing; Mammon; Loving neighbors as selves; Corporation sole imitates family; Who's your father?; "parens patria"; Order defined; Republics; "Free from things public"; Thinking Kingdom; Describing Church networking; Connecting congregations; Ordaining by God; Simplicity of Christ's way; Freedom to choose; Debt; Governments exercising authority; Virtue!; Selling yourself into bondage; Essentials of kingdom; Christians leaving Jerusalem; FEMA?; Healing as Christ taught; Sacrifice; Following Holy Spirit; Forgiveness; Types of "love"; Losing sons; Laying down your life for others; Righteous mammon; "sin"; In, but not of the world; Church "service"; Our baggage and trauma; Addictions; Coming into accord with Christ; "Persons"?; Your choice; "Worship"; "Unincorporated Association"; Being Doers of the word; Sewing underwear for Levites?; Your job; Perfect Law of Liberty; Practice virtue.

Who is the Holy Spirit? What does he do? Is this just "May the Force be with you" or is something more going on? This week in our study of 1 John, he gives us a test for the Holy Spirit. And clearly he expects the Spirit to have a very practical and personal role in our lives. Modern Christians tend to have one of two misunderstandings: either basically to ignore the Spirit or alternatively to focus way too much on the Spirit. So where does that leave us? How do we experience the hope John intends - that he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world? What is the joy we are missing? Let's talk about "The Holy Spirit" (1 John 3:24-4:6).

Memorizers often feel alone. They are a minority among minorities. Modern Christians do not memorize God's Word as previous generations. Are you looking to find other believers who practice Bible memory? Our guest today is Tim Alexander. Tim is the founder of a growing movement called ScriptureFest. ScriptureFests are events for God's people to gather to recite memorized Scripture and to engage in intense Bible study. He'll share more about the movement and how you can be a part of it. Join us for another encouraging episode of The Scripture Memory Podcast.Would you like to find the ScriptureFest nearest you or learn more about hosting ScriptureFest? Go to scripturefest.com.  Thanks for listening to The Scripture Memory Podcast! This episode is made possible by the generous support of listeners like you. To learn more about how to help further this mission, click here.

What are angels? What do they do today? When people claim to have heard from an angel, how do we know if it's real? Modern Christians often fall into two traps: disregarding the spiritual realm, or too easily believing claims about encounters with spiritual beings. Angels are real, made by God for a purpose, but we have to be on guard because the devil masquerades as an angel of light (2 Corinthians 11:14). Join host Andrew Marcus as we discuss more Spiritual Things with Dr. Chris Berg! This time, we're breaking down what angels DO and DON'T do according to the Bible, and why God operates this way at all. This is a crucial conversation for discerning between truth and lies about the role of angels in our world and in the Church, so that we can hold fast to Scripture!

Getting a clear view of the good news; Hebrew language; "nakah" = "Smite"? Or "Establish"?; "Put to death", "Stoning"; Moses and Christ preaching the same message; Contextual understanding; Letters from Early Church time; False messiahs?; Name confusion; Living as free souls under God; Seeing the truth; Parthia connection; Filling in the answers; Mark 2 in Capernaum; Healings; Dead Sea Scrolls; Overthrowing orthodoxy?; Golden calf; Sitting in darkness; Using Tree of Knowledge?; Preaching the "word" (logos); The palsied man; Uncovering the roof; Reason for forgiving sins; Forgiveness; Defining "Blasphemy"; Denying true nature of God; Sacrificing at the altars; Burning bones?; Strange fire?; "Wrath" of God; Giver of life; Freewill offerings; Leaving judgment to God; Christ's weightier matters; Mark 2:10 "power"; Admiring Jewish philosophers; Word established by God; Followers of Jesus; "sinners"; Sharing vs forcing; "Modern" Christians; Repentance; Revealing truth; Approaching Holy Spirit; Mark 2:19; Why not fast?; Story-telling; Distraction of fasting; Bridegroom with them?; Food that feeds the spirit; Bride vs harlot based on reasoning; Metaphors; Making idols; Unlawful for sabbath?; Caeser son of God; Government dole?; Murdering Gauls; "Free" bread; Sabbath; Going into debt; Choosing to remain a servant/slave; Ruling judges; Obedience to the Father; Essenes; Pythagoras; Destroying liberty; Loving neighbor as self (charity); Teaching mercy and forgiveness; Standing in the gap; Increasing government force; Sabbath made for man? Speaking to Pharisees; The "way" of the Sabbath; No forcing neighbor!; Our dominion; Violating Sabbath; Is taxation stealing?; Coveting?; Altars are people; Distortion of the old testament; Corban = sacrifice; Being "registered"; Tables of rulers; Christ's solution; Justin's apology - assembling on Sunday (1st day); Sharing with those in need; Protection drawing subjection; The light of loving neighbor; "Worship"; Ps 69:22; Rom 11:9; Giving away God's endowments; Lk 22:25; President?; Judeo-Christian philosophy; Benefactors; Mt 20:25; Mark 10:42; Ecc 11:1; Why 7 men?; Welfare snare; Casting bread upon the waters; Red Heifer; 1 John 3:14; Loving brethren; Government of, for and by the people; Laying down our lives; Fast from force.

Hell is a relic from a fear-based, fire-and-brimstone age, a cruel tool used by church authorities to maintain power and control. So why did Jesus himself mention it so much? Why is he the number-one user of the word “hell” in the entire Bible? Why was he unembarrassed to talk about fire, darkness, and eternal death? Modern Christians need to know Christ's answers. Part 2 of 2.Today's Tough Questions: How to talk to Christian friends and family about drunkenness?** Program note: This is the radio edit of our program! On April 29, "Time of Grace With Mike Novotny" started broadcasting on the many FM and AM stations of the Faith Radio Network. Here's a link to the station listings. Going forward, the radio edits will populate this podcast feed!For more resources that help you stay rooted in Jesus, check us out at timeofgrace.org where you can also subscribe to our daily email!Check out our video project, Bible Breath With Pastor Jeremy Mattek! https://timeofgrace.vhx.tv/bible-breathCheck out our other podcasts! Search for these on your favorite podcast app.– The Nonmicrowaved Truth with C.L. Whiteside– Little Things, with Amber Albee Swenson– Bible Threads, with Dr. Bruce Becker– Evening Encouragements With Pastor Jeremy– Grace Talks Daily DevotionalsIf you have questions and want to know more about God, like what does he think of you, what exactly was Jesus all about, how do you get “saved” and just what exactly does it mean to “get saved,” and what you should do next, we want you to download this free resource Pastor Mike wrote called, The Basics: God. You. Jesus. Faith.

Hell is a relic from a fear-based, fire-and-brimstone age, a cruel tool used by church authorities to maintain power and control. So why did Jesus himself mention it so much? Why is he the number-one user of the word “hell” in the entire Bible? Why was he unembarrassed to talk about fire, darkness, and eternal death? Modern Christians need to know Christ's answers. Part 1 of 2. Today's Tough Questions: Where's the Evidence the Bible Is True? ** Program note: This is the radio edit of our program! On April 29, "Time of Grace With Mike Novotny" started broadcasting on the many FM and AM stations of the Faith Radio Network. Here's a link to the station listings. Going forward, the radio edits will populate this podcast feed!For more resources that help you stay rooted in Jesus, check us out at timeofgrace.org where you can also subscribe to our daily email!Check out our video project, Bible Breath With Pastor Jeremy Mattek! https://timeofgrace.vhx.tv/bible-breathCheck out our other podcasts! Search for these on your favorite podcast app.– The Nonmicrowaved Truth with C.L. Whiteside– Little Things, with Amber Albee Swenson– Bible Threads, with Dr. Bruce Becker– Evening Encouragements With Pastor Jeremy– Grace Talks Daily DevotionalsIf you have questions and want to know more about God, like what does he think of you, what exactly was Jesus all about, how do you get “saved” and just what exactly does it mean to “get saved,” and what you should do next, we want you to download this free resource Pastor Mike wrote called, The Basics: God. You. Jesus. Faith.

Alternative historian and researcher Brandon Kroll beams in to discuss the truth about the Anunnaki, the Nephilim, and the influence of numerology conspiracies on modern society, religion and geopolitics on episode 160 of the Far Out with Faust podcast.

Modern Christians tend to misunderstand two of Jesus’ most radical teachings: his prohibition against divorce and remarriage, and his teaching about the Church. But what if this isn’t just a coincidence? After all, the biblical texts explaining marriage tend to do so by comparing it to Christ’s relationship with the Church, and vice versa. Does this explain why the Protestant Reformers broke with the earliest Christians (and the New Testament) on both of these doctrines? And also… does getting this wrong open the door to polygamy? Transcript: Welcome back to Sham…

Much of what the Apostle Paul preached in his day was more relevant in dealing with the evils existing amidst the churches he started than that which existed in the days of the Prophets. What was written in the past is the foundation upon which we stand, but metaphorically, the foundation cannot cover us from the elements. Present truth forms the walls and roof of Christ's 21st-century church to protect us from today's storms of idolatry and iniquity. Modern Christians face evils that no other time in history faced.

When Casey Perez walked away from the Mormon Church, he didn't just leave behind a congregation; he discovered a tapestry of anarchy and voluntaryism hidden within its teachings. In this profound discussion, we find unexpected solidarity with anarchist thought, as Casey unveils how the Book of Mormon's scriptures and doctrines mirror the principles of societal autonomy and individual freedom. Our exchange traverses religious and ideological frontiers, inviting both Mormons and non-Mormons to embrace the underlying values that bind us together as a global family.  The conversation shifts as we contemplate the personal changes spurred by political disillusionment and debates over the constitution, intensified by the pandemic. As we consider the emotional impact of mandates on both individuals and communities, we delve into the debris of societal pressures. In doing so, we discover a widespread desire for a support network and a community that values individual choice, and we explore the role of authority and governance from a perspective of spiritual enlightenment, not political will.   Wrapping up, we look beyond the horizon of today's interpretations of LDS texts, questioning traditional views on government, war, and America's place in divine providence. We explore the notion of modern slavery within our own societal structures and discuss the frustrations of many modern Christians with the current state of affairs.  We question divine providence in the American founding and probe the implications of the government's hand in modern slavery. Our quest for understanding takes us from the battlefield of American history to the heart of Christian anarchy, culminating in a call to action for the Mormon community to consider the anarchy threaded within their beliefs. Whether your interest lies in faith, freedom, or the crossroads where they meet, join us for a stimulating conversation that promises to challenge and enlighten.   Connect with Casey: Substack: mackenziesspleen.substack.com Bandcamp: Potbelly MacKraken   Episode Starting Points: (00:02) - Anarchy and the Book of Mormon (08:04) - Churches and Conversion to Anarchy (18:27) - COVID Horror Stories and Vaccine Mandates (25:12) - Understanding the LDS Scriptural Canon (32:13) - Anarchy in the Book of Mormon (39:28) - Government and Anarchy in LDS Scriptures (49:43) - Beliefs on God, Constitution, and Slavery (59:30) - Frustration of Modern Christians and Anarchism (01:09:07) - Promoting Anarchy in the Mormon Community   For more on this episode and The Bad Roman Project: For Full Show Notes: https://www.thebadroman.com/show-notes/episode-101 Blog submissions: thebadroman.com/contribute-to-the-blog Connect with us on social: thebadroman.com/social-links Want to get more involved? Request to join the private discussion group on Facebook (Bad Romans Only!!) No King but Christ Network: nokingbutchristnetwork.com   SUPPORT THE SHOW: thebadroman.com/donate  

Heavenly father, we come to you with hearts of gratefulness thanksgiving and hearts of love. We thank you that you are a glorious God, a great God and a gracious God, and we thank you heavenly Father, that despite our spiritual blindness, the veils over our eyes, the lies of Satan over the eyes of our faith. Lord, you offer us vision, the vision that is gifted to us when we look to the cross of Jesus Christ. Christ, when we look to the cross, we see God, the Son of God and the Son of man bearing the full condemnation that we deserve for our sins, for our blindness, our willful ignorance.And Lord, you offer us by grace through faith, sight of you, you promise us that those who are pure in heart will see God. And Lord, we today ask for the purity of heart. We repent of our sins, of our pride, of anything that gets in the way of seeing you. And Lord, if there are other veils over our hearts, over our minds, over our faith, I pray today, unwrap them, unravel them, and give us a clear sight of who you are, what you've called us to do. Lord, we thank you for the holy scriptures. We thank you that in the scriptures we meet Christ and in the scriptures we hear from Christ. And in the scriptures we learn that Christ calls us to a life of self-denial.Lord, you'd call us to take up our crosses on a daily basis and follow you. That's what it means to be a believer. And I pray, Lord, if there's areas in our life where we deny you instead of self, I pray, you give us grace to switch that and deny self and follow you. And Lord, if there's anyone who is not yet a believer, who has not seen the truth of who you are and the truth that there is a chasm between every sinner and the holy God, and only Jesus Christ is powerful enough to bridge that chasm and he does so with his work on the cross.I pray, Lord, if anyone is still blind to you, that you give them eyes to see today, regenerate their hearts, save them, draw them to yourself and give them the gift of eternal life. Save their soul and save their soul for eternity and make us the people that continue to care about the lost souls around us as we look at them with compassion. I pray, Lord Jesus, pour out the Holy Spirit and save many, send a great awakening and a great revival in this land and beyond. And we pray all this in Christ's holy name. Amen. We're continuing our sermon series through the incredible work, the Gospel of Mark and we've entitled the series Kingdom Come the Gospel of Mark in the Secret of God's Kingdom. And the idea comes from the fact that Jesus Christ has come.He has inaugurated his kingdom with the gospel message. He says, repent and believe for the kingdom of God is here. And then, once we follow him, Jesus calls us to pray. Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be your name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. So Lord, already your kingdom is here, but we want your kingdom to expand in our lives, in our hearts with our faith, and the Lord does that. The title of sermon today is What's Blind But Now, I See and that's a lyric from the beloved hymn, Amazing Grace. Anytime anyone gets baptized at Mosaic, we sing this downstairs. "Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me, I once was lost but now am found, was blind, but now I see."Blindness is one of the most precise metaphors to describe our spiritual condition apart from God's grace. In our natural, sinful, unconverted, unregenerated state, we're blind to the most important dimension of reality. And that's the spiritual realm. We're blind to the truth about the existence of God, the person of God, the will of God, and coming to the realization of the truth, the veracity, the reality of God, who he truly is. What happens is the Lord opens up the eyes of your heart, eyes that you had never even known to exist. The eyes of faith. CS Lewis once presented a paper at the Oxford Socratic Club entitled, Is Theology Poetry?And in that paper he has this one line where he says, "I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen. Not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else." And when you see Christ for who he truly is, you begin to see reality as it truly is. With that said, would you look at our text today, Mark chapter eight verses 22 through 38, "And they came to Bethsaida and some people brought to him a blind man and begged him to touch him and he took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the village. And when he had spit on his eyes and laid his hands on him, he asked him, do you see anything? And he looked up and said, I see people but they look like trees walking. Then Jesus laid his hands on his eyes again and he opened his eyes, his sight was restored and he saw everything clearly.""And he sent him to his home saying, do not even enter the village. And Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi. And on the way he asked his disciples, who do people say that I am? And they told him, John the Baptist and others say Elijah and others, one of the prophets. And he asked them, but who do you say that I am? Peter answered Him, you are the Christ. And he strictly charged him to tell no one about him. And he began to teach them that the son of man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed. And after three days rise again. And he said this plainly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him."But turning and seeing his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, get behind me Satan, for you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man. And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, if anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospels will save it for what is the prophet of man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul for what can man give in return for his soul, for whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation of him, will the son of man also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels?This is the reading of God's holy and infallible, authoritative word. May he write these eternal truths upon our hearts. Three points to frame up our time today. First, a blind man healed progressively. Second, a blind disciple sanctified incrementally and finally, follow Christ with eyes wide open to the cost. First, a blind man healed progressively. The scene right before this text is one in which Jesus was continuing to teach his disciples and the scene in which they had a difficulty grasping the truths of who Christ is, of what it means that he is the Messiah. And in chapter eight verse 18, he says to them, "Having eyes do you not see?"And immediately after that text, we get a symbolic healing of a blind man, but it's not instantaneous. He's healed after first passing through an intermediate state of indistinct vision. And there's a deliberate juxtaposition here that the Holy Spirit is giving us in showing us that the disciples don't really see yet because they are approaching the teaching of Jesus with their own manmade categories of teachings they had received from the scribes and the Pharisees. So not only does he have to dismantle their categories and then, fill them in order to give them sight, but he has to give them grace to actually do that. And the juxtaposition is deliberately reinforced by showing us that in the same way that Jesus needs to touch a blind man twice, he needs to touch his disciples over and over to give them clarity of sight.And the theme before us is distortion of vision. Spiritually speaking, that's every single one of us, all of the time. That apart from God's grace, apart from the spiritual eye surgery that the Lord offers us from his word and through his spirit, we don't see as we ought to see things get in the way the world gets in the way, the flesh gets in the way, our own misguided ideas of what God is get in the way. And then also, there are layers of demonic lives that the Lord needs to unravel, not to mention our sin. Jesus Christ and the sermon in the mountain, what did he say? He said, "Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God," that there is a purity that is necessitated for us to see God with clarity.Verse 22, we pick up the story. They, the disciples in Jesus came to Bethsaida and some people brought to him a blind man and begged him to touch him once again. We see this pattern that we've seen often in the Gospel of Mark, that it's friends who see their friend. Friends whose hearts are filled with compassion for a friend who's ailing and they do everything to bring that person to Jesus. And they beg Jesus, "Please heal our friend." They believe enough. They believe enough that Jesus in his power to bring their friend to Christ and then, they beg him to heal him. The faith of others here besides the inflicted man is involved. And this shows that the importance of intercessory prayer to God on behalf of others, on behalf of the physically and the spiritually blind.In the same way that it's a miracle that Jesus heals the blind man, gives him sight. It's even a greater miracle that God gives spiritual sight to anybody. It's an incredible miracle that he saves anybody. He's almighty. He can save anyone. Yes, we must pray. We must pray for our friends, our neighbors, those people in our lives, in our spheres of influence that do not yet know the Lord, can we give them eyesight to see Christ for who he is, we cannot. We are helpless, but can we bring them to the Lord? Can we beg the Lord? Lord in my prayers, I'm interceding on behalf of my neighbors, of my community, of the people that I see every day rub shoulders with every day who are so far from you.They have souls, eternal souls and their eternity hangs in the balance. Lord save them, and we see this pattern and that's incredible pattern for us. A lot of people like talking about the compassion of Jesus Christ that before he heals anyone, he does feel compassion for them. While the greatest level of compassion that you can feel for anybody is, have a compassion for their souls, for their eternity. Verse 23, "And he took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the village. And when he had spit in his eyes and laid his hands on him, he asked him, do you see anything? He takes the blind man by the hand and leads him out of the village. Why? He doesn't want to make a spectacle of this in a village, a small village. There are no secrets.The Lord wants to deal with this man privately and the seclusion away from the crowd. In the same way, that Jesus here takes the man by the hand, God took Israel by the hand, led them out of Egypt to shows his care for the person. The word for eyes here in the Greek is the more poetic term, it's not just physical eyes, but it also has a spiritual dimension. And Jesus is in the business not just of healing physically, he wants to heal the person's soul. The saliva was to draw the man's attention to what Jesus is about to do. The laying on of hands has the same effect. Touch means something incredibly profound to a blind man. In verse 24, he looked up and he said, "I see people but they look like trees, walking." He says, "I see, but it's indistinct. I see, but something is off."And here you pause and you say, despite Christ's touch, there's still an obstacle to the blind man's complete healing. His perception is still fractured. The healing isn't complete. The man is not blind anymore, but neither does he see with fully functional eyes. In contrast to all the other healings in the gospel, this is the only one that comes in a two-step process. It's not instantaneous. And the intermediate state of the man's vision after Jesus' first touch is symbolic. It is symbolic, what happens with the disciples? They see Jesus, but they don't really understand who he is. Not fully, not truly. There is an understanding of seeing but not seeing of already but not yet. There is an understanding that we are to grow in our vision and our spiritual insight.And the Christian walk is compared to life to begin a walk with the Lord Jesus Christ to be regenerated. It's as if you were born again, Jesus uses that language and that metaphor. It's as if you were spiritually dead inside, blind did not see. And the moment you come to the Lord Jesus Christ, you repent of your sin. You believe in him, and you're born. You're born again. And then as a baby needs to grow as we too as believers need to grow in maturity and understanding and in health, First Corinthians 13, a famous passage, but verses nine through 12 here are particularly relevant.St. Paul says, "For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child. I thought like a child, I reason like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face-to-face. Now I know in part and then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known, will we know God fully in this life? No, but we are to attempt to grow as much as we possibly can. Seek the Lord's illumination from the holy scriptures and from his Holy Spirit. Darkness has begun to give way to light, but there's still demonic resistance in this world.There's still demonic lies that we have been fed that we need unveiled from our faith. Another contact with Christ is necessary and we are to be believers that say, Lord, I want to grow. I want to grow beyond where I am. I want to see you more clearly. I want to know you in a deeper way, in a fresher way. Lord, give me a fresh encounter. Give me a fresh touch, Lord, I see, but not the way I know I'm supposed to see. And when we come to the Lord with that posture of heart, he loves to answer that prayer of Lord, give me another touch from your hand. Mark 8:25, then Jesus laid his hands on his eyes again and he opened his eyes, his sight was restored and he saw everything clearly. Jesus again lays his hands on the man's eyes and it says His sight was restored.Perhaps this is explaining to us that he had seen at one time had sight at one time, he knew what trees looked like subsequently had lost his sight. We're not sure. Either way, he now sees everything, clearly. There's restoration of physical sight and then also a Lord willing spiritual health. The Lord loves to reveal secrets and mysteries that are profound, that beyond our understanding when we come to him in First Corinthians 13:2 for example. It says, "If I have prophetic powers and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains but have not love, I am nothing." And a lot of us we love to put the emphasis on the love part.Don't forget the love part. That's the most important. Yes, don't forget the love part, but here in this text it's showing us that there are mysteries and there is a knowledge that the Lord does reveal and he can reveal to those who continue to seek him and seek him humbly. Gradual growth and vision is a symbol for a progression and spiritual understanding. Verse 26, and Jesus sent him to his home saying, do not even enter the village. Jesus doesn't want to be known as just a miracle worker. He doesn't want to be known as just the person you go to, to have your physical needs met. He's not a divine pinata or a vending machine. He isn't Santa Claus upgraded.No, he's here to save souls sin six souls and illuminate the eyes of the heart. And that brings us to 0.2, a blind disciple sanctified incrementally. Verse 27, "And Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi. And on the way he asked his disciples, who do people say that I am?" What he's getting at is what's the public opinion? Jesus has been ministering for quite some time. He's done miracles, he's taught many sermons. And Jesus is saying what's the consensus? In verse 28, they told him John the Baptist and others say Elijah and others, one of the prophets.It's not surprising that Jesus would be identified as a great figure of the past, returned from the dead even, given the widespread ancient Jewish belief that saints were alive. All these roles of the prophets of John the Baptist of Elijah, they were roles of preparation, not fulfillment, not consummation. John the Baptist came to prepare the way for Jesus Christ and he did that by saying, repent, believe. The king is here, turn to the king. And now, the king has come and there is a fulfillment of the prophecies. Mark 8:29, "And he asked them, but who do you say that I am? Peter answered him, you are the Christ." Here in the Greek, there's an emphatic you but you.You, who do you say that I am? This is the most important question that every single human being needs to answer while still alive. Who do you say that Jesus is? And Peter correctly says, "You're the Christ." That's the Greek translation of the Aramaic Messiah. You're the Messiah. You're the anointed expected king of Israel. You're the one who's going to come to teach us the righteous ways of God and established God's dominion. And in the Jewish theology, the scribes and the Pharisees had come up with a whole theology of what the Messiah would come to do. In Jewish theology of the time, the Messiah was expected to be entirely human, like King David was a great king and he loved the Lord.He knew the Lord and he established the kingdom of Israel. They thought the son of David would be much greater than David, but he would just be a son of David. He would just be human. And for a human being to establish his kingdom, the human being has to be alive. A human being builds a kingdom through victory, through taking dominion. And here, Jesus Christ, "Yes, Peter, you're correct," but later he is going to continue to restore and heal Peter's wrongheaded spiritual vision and definition of the Messiah. There was no general expectation that the Messiah would suffer or die. What kind of king dies as he's establishing a kingdom? If the king dies, the kingdom dies.If Jesus, you are the Messiah and you die, the movement is over. It's done. Peter gets the title, right, as we see, but he has no understanding of what the Messiah has come to do. And Peter, where did you get this understanding that Jesus is the Messiah. It was given to him through divine revelation. In Matthew 16, the parallel passage verse 16, "Simon Peter replied, You're the Christ, the son of the living God. And Jesus answered him, blessed are you Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you but my father who is in heaven. And I tell you, you are Peter. And on this rock I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.""I'll give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven and whatever you lose on earth shall be loose in heaven. Then he strictly charged the disciples to tell no one that he was the Christ." And that's how our paragraph ends in Mark 8:30. He strictly charged them to tell no one about him, strictly charged. Another translation says vehemently ordered. It's the same word for rebuke, used later in verse 33. He rebukes them. Don't tell anyone that I'm the Messiah, partially because Peter doesn't fully understand what that means. And by teaching people that Jesus is the Messiah would be the blind leading the blind, so to speak.Mark 8:31, "And he began to teach them that the son of man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed. And after three days rise again." This is the first three of the passion predictions in the Gospel of Mark, and Jesus here continues to teach. He has come to teach. And what is he doing by teaching? He's establishing his kingdom because his kingdom is a kingdom of truth. The way that he dismantles the kingdom of the evil one is by dismantling the lies, supplanting the lies, replacing them with truth. And what is he teaching? He's teaching Peter. He's teaching the crowds. What kind of Messiah he is?He says, "The son of man must suffer." It's necessary. He used the word must. He must suffer. He must be rejected. He must be killed. He must rise again. What's the word must mean? It means there's no other way. This is the only possibility. This is the only potential path for human redemption. There is a divine compulsion. Why? Because this is the will of God. This is the will of God the Father. There's divine necessity. He begins to teach them because they needed to be taught because no human could come up with an idea like this, that God would come and die. How can God die? How can the Son of God die? That Jesus Christ, the incarnate Lord is to be beaten, scorched, mocked, tried, tested, forsake and crucified dead and would be buried.And the necessity of Jesus' death is also ... it is a necessity because he is to fulfill the scriptures. The scriptures prophesied that the suffering servant will come, Isaiah 52, Isaiah 53. Clearly, it's about Jesus Christ. And then, Jesus uses the title Son of Man and part of the background for the son of man is Adam. When Adam and Eve sinned, they were cursed with various sufferings by God. So if God is going to redeem humanity, one who is like human, who is the son of man, the son of Adam, who needs to represent the people. He needs to be fully man and fully God and Daniel seven is a great prophecy that this ancient of days, son of man, son of God is coming and he's coming to redeem humanity.He will be rejected by the elders, the Sanhedrin, the priestly court of Israel will scrutinize the claims of Jesus and then deliberately reject him. And he says, "After three days will rise again." The phrase after three days and on the third day, our equivalent phrases is because of how they measured time in that culture. Mark 8:32, "And he said this plainly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him." Now, Peter was the first apostle chosen by Jesus. Peter was in the inner group of the big three of the disciples. It was Peter, James and John. The sons of thunder that Jesus called him. And Peter perhaps, because he thought of that proximity, allowed him to speak into Jesus' life.All of a sudden he feels bold enough to take Jesus' aside, and there is a sense of the fact that, in the language, that he's patronizing Jesus. And then, the word says that he began to rebuke Jesus and as soon as Jesus specifies the kind of Messiah he is, Peter, he can't fit that definition of the Messiah into his mind, and he begins to wonder, "You know what, Jesus, perhaps your mom was right, perhaps your siblings were right. Perhaps you are out of your mind. The Messiah to suffer, that doesn't make any sense." It seemed so nonsensical to Peter that it was almost demonic, what kind of paradoxical Messiah is this? He begins to rebuke Jesus Christ.And the same word for rebuke is what Jesus used when he cast out demons, he rebuked them. It's almost as if Peter here is rebuking a demonic idea. "Jesus, what are you talking about? You're the Messiah. We're here. We follow you. You're supposed to be the king, you're going to establish the kingdom and we're going to have positions in your kingdom. And you're talking about death. What are you talking about?" As soon as Jesus begins to define what kind of Messiah he is, as soon as Jesus begins to specify the kind of Messiah he is, everything changes for Peter. And we live in a day and age where people are fine talking about God in general. They're fine talking about faith in general, fine talking about even Jesus in general.As soon as you begin to specify, as soon as you begin to define terms, that's when people take up arms, and that's what's happening with Peter, a Messiah who will suffer, die and rise again. Peter has the gall to rebuke Jesus and to rebuke Jesus in the strongest of terms. He sees what God's will is. And he's like, "No, no, no, no. Lord, you're doing it wrong." I don't know if you've ever rebuked the Lord. We've all had that temptation where you ask for something and the Lord gives you something diametrically opposed to what you asked for. You're like, "Lord, you're not doing your job right, Lord. Let me help you do your job. Perhaps I'm better being God than you are."That's what's going on here. He is correcting Jesus. He is rebuking Jesus and it doesn't go well. And Mark 8:33, "But turning and seeing his disciples, he Jesus rebuked Peter and said, get behind me Satan, for you're not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man." Peter rebukes Jesus, Jesus rebukes Peter. Guess who won? Jesus wins. Don't rebuke Jesus, be careful of rebuking the Lord. Apparently, this idea that the Messiah would not suffer, it had taken root even in the other disciple's hearts, so Jesus turns to everyone and makes an example of Peter. Peter wasn't unique in his obtuseness. They had inherited this interpretation of the Messiah, inherited it from people.It's not from the holy scriptures and the holy scriptures is clear. Isaiah 52, Isaiah 53, Psalm 22, clearly prophetic passages that show that the Messiah will suffer. And here what Jesus is doing is he's nullifying the lie and he's nullifying this lie with the truth. He's telling Peter, so to speak, "Peter, you have come to me with old wineskins of a definition of the Messiah." An old wine skin of the definition of God, of how God works, but if you are to have new wine, new wine means that this is completely new and the new wine needs to come in new wine skins. So it's truth that we want to accept from the Lord, but we can't just accept it into our lives without having the Lord completely change the receptacle of that truth.He says, "Get behind me Satan." Harsh words, but I do want to pause here and show the grace in it that Jesus isn't rejecting Peter. "Peter, you're wrong. You're so wrong and you've actually ... you're trying to rebuke me with a lie of Satan," but he's not rejecting Peter. Peter remains a disciple of Jesus Christ and we see the grace of God there. How often have we been so misguided about the Lord, so misguided about understanding who he is and understanding what it means to follow him and he continues to give us grace. Later on chapter nine, actually Jesus takes Peter, James and John onto the Mount and he transfigure in front of them, reveals who he truly is and reveals that he has given Peter more grace.By saying, "Get behind me, Satan." Jesus isn't saying get away from me. He's not banishing Peter forever with this rebuke. No, what he's saying is, get behind me. I am God. I am the Messiah. You are to follow me. Get behind me. Resume the path of following a path that you have momentarily forsaken. I'm the Lord and you are not. And this is a command to Peter. "Resume the path of discipleship rather than trying to lead Jesus Christ." When Jesus used the word Satan, he means, adversary, adversary of divine purpose. Peter here, at least temporarily is opposing the will of God and he needs to understand that he is on the side of Satan when he opposes God. Jesus reveals truth to Peter and as new truth is revealed, old lies must be rooted out.And who does Peter look like here? Well, Peter is half percipient, half insensible condition is similar to the sufferer that we had just read about in the previous narrative. The person who was half seeing, half blinded. And Jesus reveals to Peter that he needs another touch from Christ. He needs more teaching, more revelation. He says to Peter, "You're not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man." This is where Peter was demonic and that Peter, you're offering me the same path that Satan offered me. And if you remember Jesus when he was fasting in the wilderness for 40 days and Satan comes to tempt him and Satan takes him to the top of the mountain, he says, "Look at all the cities, look at the kingdoms." I'll give everything to you if you fall down and worship me."And what's Satan tempting him with? Jesus, you've come to get the crown. I'll give you the crown. Just don't go to the cross. He understood that if Jesus goes to the cross, he's going to ultimately defeat Satan's sin and death. He's like, "Jesus, let's not do that. You can have all the kingdoms, but let me reign through sin," and Jesus telling Peter, "Peter, you're on the side of Satan. You're tempting me with the same path." The holy scripture often talks about the blinding power of Satan over unbelievers. That apart from the grace of Jesus Christ, we're all blinded to the truth. St. Paul, when he shares his testimony to King Agrippa in Acts 26.This is what the text says in Acts 26:12, "In this connection I journeyed to Damascus with the authority and commission of the chief priest. At midday, O king, I saw on the way a light from heaven, brighter than the sun that shone around me in those who journeyed with me. And when we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice saying to me in the Hebrew language, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It's hard for you to kick against the goads. And I said, who are you, Lord? And the Lord said, I'm Jesus whom you are persecuting, but rise and stand upon your feet, for I have appeared to you for this purpose, to appoint you as a servant and witness to the things in which you have seen me and to those in which I will appear to you, delivering you from your people and from the gentiles to whom I am sending you."To open their eyes, so that they may turn from darkness to light, from the power of Satan to God that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me. Saul, before he becomes Paul, he was so zealous for the Lord, but he was so blind in his zeal. He was on a path to Damascus to go and persecute Christians, to murder Christians, and he thought he was doing this in the name of the Lord. And then Jesus appears to him and says, "Why are you persecuting me?" And at that point, Saul could have been like, "I'm not persecuting you Jesus. I got nothing against you. I'm persecuting your followers." Jesus so closely connects himself with his followers, with his church. He says, "By persecuting the church, you're persecuting me."And then Paul gets saved and God gives him a mission to do what? To proclaim the gospel and to help people begin to see God for who he is. Second Corinthians four, continues this theme, "And even if our gospel is veiled, it has veiled to those who are perishing. In their case, the God of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ who is the image of God. For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ is Lord. With ourselves as your servants, for Jesus' sake, for God who said, let light shine out of the darkness has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ."How does Satan blind people? He blinds them with lies. If you don't believe in God, you're believing a lie and all of a sudden you're closed off to even the possibility of who God is. If you don't believe in Christ, if you don't believe in what Christ has come to do, you're blinded to the reality of Christ. If you don't believe in the scriptures, you're blinded to the reality of the truth of God's word. And only divine grace permits us to escape this condition of satanic blindness. And demonic blindness is only countered with divine revelation. There's nothing capable of ending this alienation between us and God and the blindness of humanity to God's will except to look to Christ on the cross. As Messiah, Jesus is not only God's holy warrior, but he's also the teacher.And this is why Jesus came to teach. His primary role in his ministry was to teach in order to combat the lies of the enemy so that when people come to know the truth, they begin to see God for who he is. Isaiah 11:2, "And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him and the spirit of wisdom and understanding and the spirit of counsel and might." When we grow closer to Christ, we grow closer to the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit longs to reveal wisdom and understanding and counsel and might. Modern Christians today, we've been cushioned by 2000 years of church teaching to the point where we understand the Messiah is supposed to suffer. That idea is unremarkable. To the Jewish people of that time, the idea of a Messiah was the idea of triumph, not of suffering, not of death.And Peter agrees, "Jesus, you are the Messiah," but the question is, how does the Messiah triumph over his enemies? Well, at this point, Peter, we have to have a conversation. Who are your greatest enemies? Peter and Peter, in that frame of mind, before Jesus corrects him, he would say Caesar Augustus or he would say Pontius Pilate or King Herod, these are our greatest enemies, Lord Jesus. Let's build an army together. You are the king, clearly. You just fed 5,000 men. They're pretty happy about it. Just continue doing that and then, we can take over. We're going to take over Jerusalem and then from there, we're going to build your kingdom, because those are our greatest enemies. It's evil people out there. It's evil people in positions of power.Jesus, that's who we need you to get rid of, put us in positions of power and all of a sudden, we're just going to take over. And Jesus will push back and say, "Peter, those aren't your greatest enemies." Before this Caesar, there was another Caesar and many more before that and there will be Caesars after. No, that's not your greatest enemy. It's not, people in politics. It's not your greatest enemy, your greatest enemies. And unless you know this, then you've already lost, but your greatest enemies are Satan, sin and death. Well, if Satan is your greatest enemy, how do you take Satan out? That's a really important question. Well, you take him out by taking his greatest hit.You take Satan's greatest hit, and that's exactly what happened on the cross. Jesus Christ allowed Satan through his human pawns to crucify him. Satan, that's the greatest weapon. You have to kill me. He takes on Satan, but he wasn't just taking on Satan, he was also taking on sin. Well, Peter, if we take over this Caesar, what happens to sin? What happens to the sin in your own heart, Peter? A lot of people say if there's a good God and all powerful God, why does he allow evil to happen in the world? Well, if Jesus Christ could annihilate evil in one second, he can do that. How many of us would still be alive? We'd all be dead. So for Christ to counter evil, to dismantle evil, to take a sin head on, he had to pay the penalty for sin on the cross.And that's why Jesus Christ on the cross, he quotes Psalm 22, which is one of the most profound texts in all of the scripture. He says, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" And you say, "How can the first person of the trinity forsake the second person of the trinity? How can the father turn his back on the Son just abandoned him on the cross and this hellacious suffering?" Well because the son had taken our sin upon himself. He who knew no sin became sin, so that we might become the righteousness of God. And then, Jesus Christ dies and through his death, what is he doing? He's giving death itself the death blow By God's grace. He didn't stay dead, he was raised.So on the cross, Jesus takes Satan head on. Takes his fiercest attack, takes on the sin of the elect and its wages and takes on death itself with his death. And praise be to God, he wins. From Peter's limited perspective, all he was thinking about was, "Jesus, I got to preserve you. Jesus, I can't let you die because if I let you die from his limited perspective, everything dies. All my dreams die. All my aspirations die." And from God's perspective, that wasn't the way. God's thoughts are so much greater than our thoughts. Praise be to God. Isaiah 55:8, "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways, my ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways than my thoughts than your thoughts?"Jesus fought Peter's believing of lies. This demonic delusion, and he does it with the truth. He does it by teaching the truth. And now, he challenges Peter and he challenges the other disciples because in their faulty understanding, if we're following an earthly political king, then what does that make us? We are your closest followers, Jesus. We're going to be in your cabinet. We're going to have thrones next to you, but if the Messiah is one who suffers. One who dies and dies a gory death on a cross. Well then what about us? If that's the kind of king that we're following, is he worth following? And Jesus proclaims here in the text, the gains and losses of following him, having prophesied his own suffering, death and resurrection, Jesus now proclaims a similar fate for his followers, and that's 0.3.Follow Christ with eyes wide open to the cost. Mark 8:34, "And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, if anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me." He calls the crowd, you've been following me. You see my miracles, you see the signs. Now, I'm calling you to become my disciples. I'm calling you to follow me, and if you are to follow me, you need to know what it's going to cost you. First of all, deny yourself. He says there's a sense of existential immediacy. Jesus is confronting the crowd. So you do you want to follow me? Well, you need to deny yourself. You need to turn from your selfish ways, deny yourself and follow me.And just how far is this self-denial expected to go? Jesus brings in the word cross. He says, "Take up your cross," and we're so accustomed to the image and the idea of the cross. There's an aura of sanctity and beauty that surrounds the idea of the cross. And it's hard for us to understand how repugnant the idea of a cross was to the people of the time. The symbol of the hated Roman occupation, a form of death so cruel, so dehumanizing, so shameful that even the most debauched regimes in human history since have not employed crucifixion as a means of executing enemies. It was the preeminent means of Rome's terror apparatus and to liken the following of Christ, the bearing of cross was as powerful way as Jesus could explain, that If you follow me, here's the terms.You must be willing to sacrifice anything and everything. You must be willing to endure anything and everything to be a follower of Jesus Christ. One of the cruel and shameful aspects of crucifixion was the criminal was forced to carry the cross or a part of the instrument to the place of crucifixion, most likely a horizontal cross beam you had to carry, which itself was called a cross, the same thing that Jesus had to carry after he was scorched, his back was torn up from the cat of nine tails, and then, he has to carry the beam across his back on the Via Dolorosa to Calvary. When his strength ended, Simon of Cyrene took over. And Jesus is saying, "Take up your cross and follow me in the same way." It's an exhortation to surrender life and saying, my life is not my own. "And Jesus is upfront about the cost, completely upfront. All of you, for all of me."If you go to the restaurant and they're like, "Yeah, lobster, it's market price, like what's market price? I don't know. Just tell me market price, order of magnitude," or you go to a medical office and you're like, "How much is this procedure?" They're like, "I don't know. We'll bill you." Jesus doesn't do that. The cost is upfront completely. He's saying it's going to take your whole life. Your life is no longer your own, and the idea that you thought your life was your own was actually sinful, and that's how we got here in the first place. And what Jesus here is doing is he's just informing the disciples that I'm Yahweh who has given the 10 commandments, and this right here is just definition of the first commandment. The first commandment is thou shall have no other gods before me.That means you'll not live for anyone more than you love God. It's a matter of reprioritizing. God, you are the greatest treasure of my life. I'm going to live for you completely. Everything in my life is secondary to that. You are God and you alone. He says, "Follow me." And the image of following Jesus is used twice here in the first clause if anyone wants to follow me. And what Jesus is saying is you either denounce self or you denounce Christ. You either denounce self or you denounce God. You can't live for God and yourself in a competing set of priorities. Verse 35, "And whoever would save his life will lose it. And whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospels will save it."It's counterintuitive, but it's true. He's saying that life, eternal life is found, true life, life to the full is found in treading the path of self death, of self-denial. Death is the way to life and the cross, the way of victory. It makes all the sense in the world. If you live for yourself and if you live for pleasure, for comfort, for self-preservation, and then you die. Well, what happens to your soul? Well, for eternity, you are experiencing condemnation. Your soul spends eternity apart from the presence of God. Why would you expect to spend eternity in the presence of God if you rejected his presence in this life? Obviously, if you live for self, you're going to experience ... you're going to lose your life.If you lose your life now and say, "Lord, I don't want to live for myself. That's not going that well. Lord, I want to live for you. I want to follow you. I want eternal life. I want it to begin now." The moment you die, it's just a transition from experiencing eternal life here to eternal life in the presence of God. Counterintuitive as it is the truth of Jesus' words about finding life on the pathway to death has not lacked witness. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn was in the Soviet gulags, as a political prisoner. And there in the gulags, he actually met the Lord. The Lord revealed himself to him. And he often wrote about this, of this experience of self death as a means of getting through whatever sacrifice he had to.He writes this in the gulag. He says, "From the moment you go to prison, you must put your cozy past firmly behind you. At the very threshold, you must say to yourself, my life is over, a little early to be sure, but there's nothing to be done about it. I shall never return to freedom. I'm condemned to die, now or a little later. I no longer have any property whatsoever. For me, those I love have died, and for them I have died. From today on, my body is useless and alien to me. Only my spirit and my conscience remain precious and important to me. And confronted by such a prisoner, the interrogator will tremble. Only the man who has renounced everything can win that victory."In verse 36, Jesus continues for what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? For what can a man give in return for his soul?" And Jesus here is saying that all the wealth of all the world, if you could accumulate all of it, all of that would not be more valuable than one human soul. And each person is confronted with the dramatic choice between death and life, between the world and his or her soul. Is anything worth more than the soul? No. The soul is more precious than all. Psalm 49 verse seven, "Truly no man can ransom another or give to God the price of his life for the ransom of their life as costly and can never suffice, that he should live on forever and never see the pit."Verse 38, "For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the son of man also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father and with the holy angels." There is a tendency both outside and within the Christian community to gloss over the crucifixion, to downplay or take offense at Jesus' crucifixion. Isaiah 52 and 53 alludes repeatedly to the onlooker's shame. They see Christ's suffering. There's a humiliation in that ... we're following him. That's our God, and Jesus says, whoever is ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation. Yes, some of his words are very difficult to receive, especially upon first hearing. Some of these words that define what sin is.Our culture shirks at it. Bristles, there's a visceral reaction. What? No, we understand that the adulterous generation, those that want nothing to do with the Lord would bristle, but what about believers? What about those who take on the name of Christ, who profess themselves to be followers of Christ? And do people do this today or are people Christians, self profess Christians, are they ashamed of the Lord's words? All too often, way too often. I saw a video clip of a sermon that a pastor has given recently and the pastor got up and said, "I think you noticed we skipped a passage of First Corinthians. We read a little bit and then skipped a passage and then continued."And the pastor said, "The reason why we skipped that passage is because, quote-unquote, yikes. That was the answer. We don't want to read the word of God out loud because yikes, because of how it makes us feel. What are you doing? You're being ashamed of the word of God. You're being ashamed of the words of Christ." And Jesus says, whoever is ashamed of me and my works, I will be ashamed of them. It's as if the son of man will be as second coming called as a witness to answer the question, are these people who profess to be yours, are they truly yours? And the answer, no, indeed, I am ashamed that they should take my name on their lips. In Matthew 7:21, the sermon in the mountain, Jesus says, "Not everyone who says to me Lord, Lord will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.""On that day, many will say to me, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and cast out demons in your name and do many mighty works in your name? And then I will declare to them, I never knew you depart from me, you workers of lawlessness." Jesus says when he comes and he will come in the Second Coming, and he will come in the glory of his father and he will come with the angels. The first time he came to inaugurate his kingdom, to establish his kingdom and offer amnesty, offer forgiveness to anyone who would turn from sin and turn to him. The second time he's coming and he's not coming to offer amnesty, he's coming in judgment. For those who are found to be in Christ, that'll be a tremendous day of rejoicing, a day of glory.For those who are found outside of Christ, that will be the worst day in all of eternity for any one of them, any one of you who are not in Christ. So today, friend, if you do not know Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, if you're not sure that he knows you, if you're not sure that you are known by him, today in prayer, as we're singing, as we're praying, respond to the Lord in your heart of hearts and cry out, "Lord Jesus, I'm blind. Help me see. Lord Jesus, I'm lost. Find me. Save me." And he will. He promises to. I'll close with Daniel 7:13 through 14, "I saw in the night visions and behold with the clouds of heaven, there came one like a son of man and he came to the ancient of days and was presented before him. And to him was given dominion and glory in a kingdom that all people's nations and languages should serve him.""His dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed." The Lord Jesus Christ offers each one of us grace today. Another touch, another encounter, another touch of healing so that we can sing amazing grace. How sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now am found. Was blind, but now, I see. Let us pray. Lord God, we thank you for the holy scriptures. We thank you Jesus that you were so gracious as to reveal yourself to us. I pray, Lord, if there's anyone here who has not been regenerated, has not been justified, I pray, save them today and put them on the path of following you the path of sanctification.And those of us who are believers, Lord I pray, clarify our sight. Give us a clear vision of who you are and a clear vision of what means to follow you. Lord, if there are areas in our life where we have not denied self, I pray, give us grace to deny self. If there are areas in our life where we have not taken up the cross that you have called us to take up, I pray, give us the grace to do that. And I pray, Lord, that as we follow you, that you give us a boldness, the courage to never be ashamed of your word, never be ashamed of you, but just be daily blown away by incredible mercy that you would choose us before the foundation of the world.That you will write our names in the book of life that you would choose to save us and sanctify us by the power of the Holy Spirit, that you would choose to use us to establish your kingdom. And I pray that you do so, evermore here and beyond. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.

Heavenly father, we come to you with hearts of gratefulness thanksgiving and hearts of love. We thank you that you are a glorious God, a great God and a gracious God, and we thank you heavenly Father, that despite our spiritual blindness, the veils over our eyes, the lies of Satan over the eyes of our faith. Lord, you offer us vision, the vision that is gifted to us when we look to the cross of Jesus Christ. Christ, when we look to the cross, we see God, the Son of God and the Son of man bearing the full condemnation that we deserve for our sins, for our blindness, our willful ignorance.And Lord, you offer us by grace through faith, sight of you, you promise us that those who are pure in heart will see God. And Lord, we today ask for the purity of heart. We repent of our sins, of our pride, of anything that gets in the way of seeing you. And Lord, if there are other veils over our hearts, over our minds, over our faith, I pray today, unwrap them, unravel them, and give us a clear sight of who you are, what you've called us to do. Lord, we thank you for the holy scriptures. We thank you that in the scriptures we meet Christ and in the scriptures we hear from Christ. And in the scriptures we learn that Christ calls us to a life of self-denial.Lord, you'd call us to take up our crosses on a daily basis and follow you. That's what it means to be a believer. And I pray, Lord, if there's areas in our life where we deny you instead of self, I pray, you give us grace to switch that and deny self and follow you. And Lord, if there's anyone who is not yet a believer, who has not seen the truth of who you are and the truth that there is a chasm between every sinner and the holy God, and only Jesus Christ is powerful enough to bridge that chasm and he does so with his work on the cross.I pray, Lord, if anyone is still blind to you, that you give them eyes to see today, regenerate their hearts, save them, draw them to yourself and give them the gift of eternal life. Save their soul and save their soul for eternity and make us the people that continue to care about the lost souls around us as we look at them with compassion. I pray, Lord Jesus, pour out the Holy Spirit and save many, send a great awakening and a great revival in this land and beyond. And we pray all this in Christ's holy name. Amen. We're continuing our sermon series through the incredible work, the Gospel of Mark and we've entitled the series Kingdom Come the Gospel of Mark in the Secret of God's Kingdom. And the idea comes from the fact that Jesus Christ has come.He has inaugurated his kingdom with the gospel message. He says, repent and believe for the kingdom of God is here. And then, once we follow him, Jesus calls us to pray. Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be your name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. So Lord, already your kingdom is here, but we want your kingdom to expand in our lives, in our hearts with our faith, and the Lord does that. The title of sermon today is What's Blind But Now, I See and that's a lyric from the beloved hymn, Amazing Grace. Anytime anyone gets baptized at Mosaic, we sing this downstairs. "Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me, I once was lost but now am found, was blind, but now I see."Blindness is one of the most precise metaphors to describe our spiritual condition apart from God's grace. In our natural, sinful, unconverted, unregenerated state, we're blind to the most important dimension of reality. And that's the spiritual realm. We're blind to the truth about the existence of God, the person of God, the will of God, and coming to the realization of the truth, the veracity, the reality of God, who he truly is. What happens is the Lord opens up the eyes of your heart, eyes that you had never even known to exist. The eyes of faith. CS Lewis once presented a paper at the Oxford Socratic Club entitled, Is Theology Poetry?And in that paper he has this one line where he says, "I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen. Not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else." And when you see Christ for who he truly is, you begin to see reality as it truly is. With that said, would you look at our text today, Mark chapter eight verses 22 through 38, "And they came to Bethsaida and some people brought to him a blind man and begged him to touch him and he took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the village. And when he had spit on his eyes and laid his hands on him, he asked him, do you see anything? And he looked up and said, I see people but they look like trees walking. Then Jesus laid his hands on his eyes again and he opened his eyes, his sight was restored and he saw everything clearly.""And he sent him to his home saying, do not even enter the village. And Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi. And on the way he asked his disciples, who do people say that I am? And they told him, John the Baptist and others say Elijah and others, one of the prophets. And he asked them, but who do you say that I am? Peter answered Him, you are the Christ. And he strictly charged him to tell no one about him. And he began to teach them that the son of man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed. And after three days rise again. And he said this plainly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him."But turning and seeing his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, get behind me Satan, for you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man. And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, if anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospels will save it for what is the prophet of man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul for what can man give in return for his soul, for whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation of him, will the son of man also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels?This is the reading of God's holy and infallible, authoritative word. May he write these eternal truths upon our hearts. Three points to frame up our time today. First, a blind man healed progressively. Second, a blind disciple sanctified incrementally and finally, follow Christ with eyes wide open to the cost. First, a blind man healed progressively. The scene right before this text is one in which Jesus was continuing to teach his disciples and the scene in which they had a difficulty grasping the truths of who Christ is, of what it means that he is the Messiah. And in chapter eight verse 18, he says to them, "Having eyes do you not see?"And immediately after that text, we get a symbolic healing of a blind man, but it's not instantaneous. He's healed after first passing through an intermediate state of indistinct vision. And there's a deliberate juxtaposition here that the Holy Spirit is giving us in showing us that the disciples don't really see yet because they are approaching the teaching of Jesus with their own manmade categories of teachings they had received from the scribes and the Pharisees. So not only does he have to dismantle their categories and then, fill them in order to give them sight, but he has to give them grace to actually do that. And the juxtaposition is deliberately reinforced by showing us that in the same way that Jesus needs to touch a blind man twice, he needs to touch his disciples over and over to give them clarity of sight.And the theme before us is distortion of vision. Spiritually speaking, that's every single one of us, all of the time. That apart from God's grace, apart from the spiritual eye surgery that the Lord offers us from his word and through his spirit, we don't see as we ought to see things get in the way the world gets in the way, the flesh gets in the way, our own misguided ideas of what God is get in the way. And then also, there are layers of demonic lives that the Lord needs to unravel, not to mention our sin. Jesus Christ and the sermon in the mountain, what did he say? He said, "Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God," that there is a purity that is necessitated for us to see God with clarity.Verse 22, we pick up the story. They, the disciples in Jesus came to Bethsaida and some people brought to him a blind man and begged him to touch him once again. We see this pattern that we've seen often in the Gospel of Mark, that it's friends who see their friend. Friends whose hearts are filled with compassion for a friend who's ailing and they do everything to bring that person to Jesus. And they beg Jesus, "Please heal our friend." They believe enough. They believe enough that Jesus in his power to bring their friend to Christ and then, they beg him to heal him. The faith of others here besides the inflicted man is involved. And this shows that the importance of intercessory prayer to God on behalf of others, on behalf of the physically and the spiritually blind.In the same way that it's a miracle that Jesus heals the blind man, gives him sight. It's even a greater miracle that God gives spiritual sight to anybody. It's an incredible miracle that he saves anybody. He's almighty. He can save anyone. Yes, we must pray. We must pray for our friends, our neighbors, those people in our lives, in our spheres of influence that do not yet know the Lord, can we give them eyesight to see Christ for who he is, we cannot. We are helpless, but can we bring them to the Lord? Can we beg the Lord? Lord in my prayers, I'm interceding on behalf of my neighbors, of my community, of the people that I see every day rub shoulders with every day who are so far from you.They have souls, eternal souls and their eternity hangs in the balance. Lord save them, and we see this pattern and that's incredible pattern for us. A lot of people like talking about the compassion of Jesus Christ that before he heals anyone, he does feel compassion for them. While the greatest level of compassion that you can feel for anybody is, have a compassion for their souls, for their eternity. Verse 23, "And he took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the village. And when he had spit in his eyes and laid his hands on him, he asked him, do you see anything? He takes the blind man by the hand and leads him out of the village. Why? He doesn't want to make a spectacle of this in a village, a small village. There are no secrets.The Lord wants to deal with this man privately and the seclusion away from the crowd. In the same way, that Jesus here takes the man by the hand, God took Israel by the hand, led them out of Egypt to shows his care for the person. The word for eyes here in the Greek is the more poetic term, it's not just physical eyes, but it also has a spiritual dimension. And Jesus is in the business not just of healing physically, he wants to heal the person's soul. The saliva was to draw the man's attention to what Jesus is about to do. The laying on of hands has the same effect. Touch means something incredibly profound to a blind man. In verse 24, he looked up and he said, "I see people but they look like trees, walking." He says, "I see, but it's indistinct. I see, but something is off."And here you pause and you say, despite Christ's touch, there's still an obstacle to the blind man's complete healing. His perception is still fractured. The healing isn't complete. The man is not blind anymore, but neither does he see with fully functional eyes. In contrast to all the other healings in the gospel, this is the only one that comes in a two-step process. It's not instantaneous. And the intermediate state of the man's vision after Jesus' first touch is symbolic. It is symbolic, what happens with the disciples? They see Jesus, but they don't really understand who he is. Not fully, not truly. There is an understanding of seeing but not seeing of already but not yet. There is an understanding that we are to grow in our vision and our spiritual insight.And the Christian walk is compared to life to begin a walk with the Lord Jesus Christ to be regenerated. It's as if you were born again, Jesus uses that language and that metaphor. It's as if you were spiritually dead inside, blind did not see. And the moment you come to the Lord Jesus Christ, you repent of your sin. You believe in him, and you're born. You're born again. And then as a baby needs to grow as we too as believers need to grow in maturity and understanding and in health, First Corinthians 13, a famous passage, but verses nine through 12 here are particularly relevant.St. Paul says, "For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child. I thought like a child, I reason like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face-to-face. Now I know in part and then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known, will we know God fully in this life? No, but we are to attempt to grow as much as we possibly can. Seek the Lord's illumination from the holy scriptures and from his Holy Spirit. Darkness has begun to give way to light, but there's still demonic resistance in this world.There's still demonic lies that we have been fed that we need unveiled from our faith. Another contact with Christ is necessary and we are to be believers that say, Lord, I want to grow. I want to grow beyond where I am. I want to see you more clearly. I want to know you in a deeper way, in a fresher way. Lord, give me a fresh encounter. Give me a fresh touch, Lord, I see, but not the way I know I'm supposed to see. And when we come to the Lord with that posture of heart, he loves to answer that prayer of Lord, give me another touch from your hand. Mark 8:25, then Jesus laid his hands on his eyes again and he opened his eyes, his sight was restored and he saw everything clearly. Jesus again lays his hands on the man's eyes and it says His sight was restored.Perhaps this is explaining to us that he had seen at one time had sight at one time, he knew what trees looked like subsequently had lost his sight. We're not sure. Either way, he now sees everything, clearly. There's restoration of physical sight and then also a Lord willing spiritual health. The Lord loves to reveal secrets and mysteries that are profound, that beyond our understanding when we come to him in First Corinthians 13:2 for example. It says, "If I have prophetic powers and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains but have not love, I am nothing." And a lot of us we love to put the emphasis on the love part.Don't forget the love part. That's the most important. Yes, don't forget the love part, but here in this text it's showing us that there are mysteries and there is a knowledge that the Lord does reveal and he can reveal to those who continue to seek him and seek him humbly. Gradual growth and vision is a symbol for a progression and spiritual understanding. Verse 26, and Jesus sent him to his home saying, do not even enter the village. Jesus doesn't want to be known as just a miracle worker. He doesn't want to be known as just the person you go to, to have your physical needs met. He's not a divine pinata or a vending machine. He isn't Santa Claus upgraded.No, he's here to save souls sin six souls and illuminate the eyes of the heart. And that brings us to 0.2, a blind disciple sanctified incrementally. Verse 27, "And Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi. And on the way he asked his disciples, who do people say that I am?" What he's getting at is what's the public opinion? Jesus has been ministering for quite some time. He's done miracles, he's taught many sermons. And Jesus is saying what's the consensus? In verse 28, they told him John the Baptist and others say Elijah and others, one of the prophets.It's not surprising that Jesus would be identified as a great figure of the past, returned from the dead even, given the widespread ancient Jewish belief that saints were alive. All these roles of the prophets of John the Baptist of Elijah, they were roles of preparation, not fulfillment, not consummation. John the Baptist came to prepare the way for Jesus Christ and he did that by saying, repent, believe. The king is here, turn to the king. And now, the king has come and there is a fulfillment of the prophecies. Mark 8:29, "And he asked them, but who do you say that I am? Peter answered him, you are the Christ." Here in the Greek, there's an emphatic you but you.You, who do you say that I am? This is the most important question that every single human being needs to answer while still alive. Who do you say that Jesus is? And Peter correctly says, "You're the Christ." That's the Greek translation of the Aramaic Messiah. You're the Messiah. You're the anointed expected king of Israel. You're the one who's going to come to teach us the righteous ways of God and established God's dominion. And in the Jewish theology, the scribes and the Pharisees had come up with a whole theology of what the Messiah would come to do. In Jewish theology of the time, the Messiah was expected to be entirely human, like King David was a great king and he loved the Lord.He knew the Lord and he established the kingdom of Israel. They thought the son of David would be much greater than David, but he would just be a son of David. He would just be human. And for a human being to establish his kingdom, the human being has to be alive. A human being builds a kingdom through victory, through taking dominion. And here, Jesus Christ, "Yes, Peter, you're correct," but later he is going to continue to restore and heal Peter's wrongheaded spiritual vision and definition of the Messiah. There was no general expectation that the Messiah would suffer or die. What kind of king dies as he's establishing a kingdom? If the king dies, the kingdom dies.If Jesus, you are the Messiah and you die, the movement is over. It's done. Peter gets the title, right, as we see, but he has no understanding of what the Messiah has come to do. And Peter, where did you get this understanding that Jesus is the Messiah. It was given to him through divine revelation. In Matthew 16, the parallel passage verse 16, "Simon Peter replied, You're the Christ, the son of the living God. And Jesus answered him, blessed are you Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you but my father who is in heaven. And I tell you, you are Peter. And on this rock I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.""I'll give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven and whatever you lose on earth shall be loose in heaven. Then he strictly charged the disciples to tell no one that he was the Christ." And that's how our paragraph ends in Mark 8:30. He strictly charged them to tell no one about him, strictly charged. Another translation says vehemently ordered. It's the same word for rebuke, used later in verse 33. He rebukes them. Don't tell anyone that I'm the Messiah, partially because Peter doesn't fully understand what that means. And by teaching people that Jesus is the Messiah would be the blind leading the blind, so to speak.Mark 8:31, "And he began to teach them that the son of man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and be killed. And after three days rise again." This is the first three of the passion predictions in the Gospel of Mark, and Jesus here continues to teach. He has come to teach. And what is he doing by teaching? He's establishing his kingdom because his kingdom is a kingdom of truth. The way that he dismantles the kingdom of the evil one is by dismantling the lies, supplanting the lies, replacing them with truth. And what is he teaching? He's teaching Peter. He's teaching the crowds. What kind of Messiah he is?He says, "The son of man must suffer." It's necessary. He used the word must. He must suffer. He must be rejected. He must be killed. He must rise again. What's the word must mean? It means there's no other way. This is the only possibility. This is the only potential path for human redemption. There is a divine compulsion. Why? Because this is the will of God. This is the will of God the Father. There's divine necessity. He begins to teach them because they needed to be taught because no human could come up with an idea like this, that God would come and die. How can God die? How can the Son of God die? That Jesus Christ, the incarnate Lord is to be beaten, scorched, mocked, tried, tested, forsake and crucified dead and would be buried.And the necessity of Jesus' death is also ... it is a necessity because he is to fulfill the scriptures. The scriptures prophesied that the suffering servant will come, Isaiah 52, Isaiah 53. Clearly, it's about Jesus Christ. And then, Jesus uses the title Son of Man and part of the background for the son of man is Adam. When Adam and Eve sinned, they were cursed with various sufferings by God. So if God is going to redeem humanity, one who is like human, who is the son of man, the son of Adam, who needs to represent the people. He needs to be fully man and fully God and Daniel seven is a great prophecy that this ancient of days, son of man, son of God is coming and he's coming to redeem humanity.He will be rejected by the elders, the Sanhedrin, the priestly court of Israel will scrutinize the claims of Jesus and then deliberately reject him. And he says, "After three days will rise again." The phrase after three days and on the third day, our equivalent phrases is because of how they measured time in that culture. Mark 8:32, "And he said this plainly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him." Now, Peter was the first apostle chosen by Jesus. Peter was in the inner group of the big three of the disciples. It was Peter, James and John. The sons of thunder that Jesus called him. And Peter perhaps, because he thought of that proximity, allowed him to speak into Jesus' life.All of a sudden he feels bold enough to take Jesus' aside, and there is a sense of the fact that, in the language, that he's patronizing Jesus. And then, the word says that he began to rebuke Jesus and as soon as Jesus specifies the kind of Messiah he is, Peter, he can't fit that definition of the Messiah into his mind, and he begins to wonder, "You know what, Jesus, perhaps your mom was right, perhaps your siblings were right. Perhaps you are out of your mind. The Messiah to suffer, that doesn't make any sense." It seemed so nonsensical to Peter that it was almost demonic, what kind of paradoxical Messiah is this? He begins to rebuke Jesus Christ.And the same word for rebuke is what Jesus used when he cast out demons, he rebuked them. It's almost as if Peter here is rebuking a demonic idea. "Jesus, what are you talking about? You're the Messiah. We're here. We follow you. You're supposed to be the king, you're going to establish the kingdom and we're going to have positions in your kingdom. And you're talking about death. What are you talking about?" As soon as Jesus begins to define what kind of Messiah he is, as soon as Jesus begins to specify the kind of Messiah he is, everything changes for Peter. And we live in a day and age where people are fine talking about God in general. They're fine talking about faith in general, fine talking about even Jesus in general.As soon as you begin to specify, as soon as you begin to define terms, that's when people take up arms, and that's what's happening with Peter, a Messiah who will suffer, die and rise again. Peter has the gall to rebuke Jesus and to rebuke Jesus in the strongest of terms. He sees what God's will is. And he's like, "No, no, no, no. Lord, you're doing it wrong." I don't know if you've ever rebuked the Lord. We've all had that temptation where you ask for something and the Lord gives you something diametrically opposed to what you asked for. You're like, "Lord, you're not doing your job right, Lord. Let me help you do your job. Perhaps I'm better being God than you are."That's what's going on here. He is correcting Jesus. He is rebuking Jesus and it doesn't go well. And Mark 8:33, "But turning and seeing his disciples, he Jesus rebuked Peter and said, get behind me Satan, for you're not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man." Peter rebukes Jesus, Jesus rebukes Peter. Guess who won? Jesus wins. Don't rebuke Jesus, be careful of rebuking the Lord. Apparently, this idea that the Messiah would not suffer, it had taken root even in the other disciple's hearts, so Jesus turns to everyone and makes an example of Peter. Peter wasn't unique in his obtuseness. They had inherited this interpretation of the Messiah, inherited it from people.It's not from the holy scriptures and the holy scriptures is clear. Isaiah 52, Isaiah 53, Psalm 22, clearly prophetic passages that show that the Messiah will suffer. And here what Jesus is doing is he's nullifying the lie and he's nullifying this lie with the truth. He's telling Peter, so to speak, "Peter, you have come to me with old wineskins of a definition of the Messiah." An old wine skin of the definition of God, of how God works, but if you are to have new wine, new wine means that this is completely new and the new wine needs to come in new wine skins. So it's truth that we want to accept from the Lord, but we can't just accept it into our lives without having the Lord completely change the receptacle of that truth.He says, "Get behind me Satan." Harsh words, but I do want to pause here and show the grace in it that Jesus isn't rejecting Peter. "Peter, you're wrong. You're so wrong and you've actually ... you're trying to rebuke me with a lie of Satan," but he's not rejecting Peter. Peter remains a disciple of Jesus Christ and we see the grace of God there. How often have we been so misguided about the Lord, so misguided about understanding who he is and understanding what it means to follow him and he continues to give us grace. Later on chapter nine, actually Jesus takes Peter, James and John onto the Mount and he transfigure in front of them, reveals who he truly is and reveals that he has given Peter more grace.By saying, "Get behind me, Satan." Jesus isn't saying get away from me. He's not banishing Peter forever with this rebuke. No, what he's saying is, get behind me. I am God. I am the Messiah. You are to follow me. Get behind me. Resume the path of following a path that you have momentarily forsaken. I'm the Lord and you are not. And this is a command to Peter. "Resume the path of discipleship rather than trying to lead Jesus Christ." When Jesus used the word Satan, he means, adversary, adversary of divine purpose. Peter here, at least temporarily is opposing the will of God and he needs to understand that he is on the side of Satan when he opposes God. Jesus reveals truth to Peter and as new truth is revealed, old lies must be rooted out.And who does Peter look like here? Well, Peter is half percipient, half insensible condition is similar to the sufferer that we had just read about in the previous narrative. The person who was half seeing, half blinded. And Jesus reveals to Peter that he needs another touch from Christ. He needs more teaching, more revelation. He says to Peter, "You're not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man." This is where Peter was demonic and that Peter, you're offering me the same path that Satan offered me. And if you remember Jesus when he was fasting in the wilderness for 40 days and Satan comes to tempt him and Satan takes him to the top of the mountain, he says, "Look at all the cities, look at the kingdoms." I'll give everything to you if you fall down and worship me."And what's Satan tempting him with? Jesus, you've come to get the crown. I'll give you the crown. Just don't go to the cross. He understood that if Jesus goes to the cross, he's going to ultimately defeat Satan's sin and death. He's like, "Jesus, let's not do that. You can have all the kingdoms, but let me reign through sin," and Jesus telling Peter, "Peter, you're on the side of Satan. You're tempting me with the same path." The holy scripture often talks about the blinding power of Satan over unbelievers. That apart from the grace of Jesus Christ, we're all blinded to the truth. St. Paul, when he shares his testimony to King Agrippa in Acts 26.This is what the text says in Acts 26:12, "In this connection I journeyed to Damascus with the authority and commission of the chief priest. At midday, O king, I saw on the way a light from heaven, brighter than the sun that shone around me in those who journeyed with me. And when we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice saying to me in the Hebrew language, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It's hard for you to kick against the goads. And I said, who are you, Lord? And the Lord said, I'm Jesus whom you are persecuting, but rise and stand upon your feet, for I have appeared to you for this purpose, to appoint you as a servant and witness to the things in which you have seen me and to those in which I will appear to you, delivering you from your people and from the gentiles to whom I am sending you."To open their eyes, so that they may turn from darkness to light, from the power of Satan to God that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me. Saul, before he becomes Paul, he was so zealous for the Lord, but he was so blind in his zeal. He was on a path to Damascus to go and persecute Christians, to murder Christians, and he thought he was doing this in the name of the Lord. And then Jesus appears to him and says, "Why are you persecuting me?" And at that point, Saul could have been like, "I'm not persecuting you Jesus. I got nothing against you. I'm persecuting your followers." Jesus so closely connects himself with his followers, with his church. He says, "By persecuting the church, you're persecuting me."And then Paul gets saved and God gives him a mission to do what? To proclaim the gospel and to help people begin to see God for who he is. Second Corinthians four, continues this theme, "And even if our gospel is veiled, it has veiled to those who are perishing. In their case, the God of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ who is the image of God. For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ is Lord. With ourselves as your servants, for Jesus' sake, for God who said, let light shine out of the darkness has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ."How does Satan blind people? He blinds them with lies. If you don't believe in God, you're believing a lie and all of a sudden you're closed off to even the possibility of who God is. If you don't believe in Christ, if you don't believe in what Christ has come to do, you're blinded to the reality of Christ. If you don't believe in the scriptures, you're blinded to the reality of the truth of God's word. And only divine grace permits us to escape this condition of satanic blindness. And demonic blindness is only countered with divine revelation. There's nothing capable of ending this alienation between us and God and the blindness of humanity to God's will except to look to Christ on the cross. As Messiah, Jesus is not only God's holy warrior, but he's also the teacher.And this is why Jesus came to teach. His primary role in his ministry was to teach in order to combat the lies of the enemy so that when people come to know the truth, they begin to see God for who he is. Isaiah 11:2, "And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him and the spirit of wisdom and understanding and the spirit of counsel and might." When we grow closer to Christ, we grow closer to the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit longs to reveal wisdom and understanding and counsel and might. Modern Christians today, we've been cushioned by 2000 years of church teaching to the point where we understand the Messiah is supposed to suffer. That idea is unremarkable. To the Jewish people of that time, the idea of a Messiah was the idea of triumph, not of suffering, not of death.And Peter agrees, "Jesus, you are the Messiah," but the question is, how does the Messiah triumph over his enemies? Well, at this point, Peter, we have to have a conversation. Who are your greatest enemies? Peter and Peter, in that frame of mind, before Jesus corrects him, he would say Caesar Augustus or he would say Pontius Pilate or King Herod, these are our greatest enemies, Lord Jesus. Let's build an army together. You are the king, clearly. You just fed 5,000 men. They're pretty happy about it. Just continue doing that and then, we can take over. We're going to take over Jerusalem and then from there, we're going to build your kingdom, because those are our greatest enemies. It's evil people out there. It's evil people in positions of power.Jesus, that's who we need you to get rid of, put us in positions of power and all of a sudden, we're just going to take over. And Jesus will push back and say, "Peter, those aren't your greatest enemies." Before this Caesar, there was another Caesar and many more before that and there will be Caesars after. No, that's not your greatest enemy. It's not, people in politics. It's not your greatest enemy, your greatest enemies. And unless you know this, then you've already lost, but your greatest enemies are Satan, sin and death. Well, if Satan is your greatest enemy, how do you take Satan out? That's a really important question. Well, you take him out by taking his greatest hit.You take Satan's greatest hit, and that's exactly what happened on the cross. Jesus Christ allowed Satan through his human pawns to crucify him. Satan, that's the greatest weapon. You have to kill me. He takes on Satan, but he wasn't just taking on Satan, he was also taking on sin. Well, Peter, if we take over this Caesar, what happens to sin? What happens to the sin in your own heart, Peter? A lot of people say if there's a good God and all powerful God, why does he allow evil to happen in the world? Well, if Jesus Christ could annihilate evil in one second, he can do that. How many of us would still be alive? We'd all be dead. So for Christ to counter evil, to dismantle evil, to take a sin head on, he had to pay the penalty for sin on the cross.And that's why Jesus Christ on the cross, he quotes Psalm 22, which is one of the most profound texts in all of the scripture. He says, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" And you say, "How can the first person of the trinity forsake the second person of the trinity? How can the father turn his back on the Son just abandoned him on the cross and this hellacious suffering?" Well because the son had taken our sin upon himself. He who knew no sin became sin, so that we might become the righteousness of God. And then, Jesus Christ dies and through his death, what is he doing? He's giving death itself the death blow By God's grace. He didn't stay dead, he was raised.So on the cross, Jesus takes Satan head on. Takes his fiercest attack, takes on the sin of the elect and its wages and takes on death itself with his death. And praise be to God, he wins. From Peter's limited perspective, all he was thinking about was, "Jesus, I got to preserve you. Jesus, I can't let you die because if I let you die from his limited perspective, everything dies. All my dreams die. All my aspirations die." And from God's perspective, that wasn't the way. God's thoughts are so much greater than our thoughts. Praise be to God. Isaiah 55:8, "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways, my ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways than my thoughts than your thoughts?"Jesus fought Peter's believing of lies. This demonic delusion, and he does it with the truth. He does it by teaching the truth. And now, he challenges Peter and he challenges the other disciples because in their faulty understanding, if we're following an earthly political king, then what does that make us? We are your closest followers, Jesus. We're going to be in your cabinet. We're going to have thrones next to you, but if the Messiah is one who suffers. One who dies and dies a gory death on a cross. Well then what about us? If that's the kind of king that we're following, is he worth following? And Jesus proclaims here in the text, the gains and losses of following him, having prophesied his own suffering, death and resurrection, Jesus now proclaims a similar fate for his followers, and that's 0.3.Follow Christ with eyes wide open to the cost. Mark 8:34, "And calling the crowd to him with his disciples, he said to them, if anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me." He calls the crowd, you've been following me. You see my miracles, you see the signs. Now, I'm calling you to become my disciples. I'm calling you to follow me, and if you are to follow me, you need to know what it's going to cost you. First of all, deny yourself. He says there's a sense of existential immediacy. Jesus is confronting the crowd. So you do you want to follow me? Well, you need to deny yourself. You need to turn from your selfish ways, deny yourself and follow me.And just how far is this self-denial expected to go? Jesus brings in the word cross. He says, "Take up your cross," and we're so accustomed to the image and the idea of the cross. There's an aura of sanctity and beauty that surrounds the idea of the cross. And it's hard for us to understand how repugnant the idea of a cross was to the people of the time. The symbol of the hated Roman occupation, a form of death so cruel, so dehumanizing, so shameful that even the most debauched regimes in human history since have not employed crucifixion as a means of executing enemies. It was the preeminent means of Rome's terror apparatus and to liken the following of Christ, the bearing of cross was as powerful way as Jesus could explain, that If you follow me, here's the terms.You must be willing to sacrifice anything and everything. You must be willing to endure anything and everything to be a follower of Jesus Christ. One of the cruel and shameful aspects of crucifixion was the criminal was forced to carry the cross or a part of the instrument to the place of crucifixion, most likely a horizontal cross beam you had to carry, which itself was called a cross, the same thing that Jesus had to carry after he was scorched, his back was torn up from the cat of nine tails, and then, he has to carry the beam across his back on the Via Dolorosa to Calvary. When his strength ended, Simon of Cyrene took over. And Jesus is saying, "Take up your cross and follow me in the same way." It's an exhortation to surrender life and saying, my life is not my own. "And Jesus is upfront about the cost, completely upfront. All of you, for all of me."If you go to the restaurant and they're like, "Yeah, lobster, it's market price, like what's market price? I don't know. Just tell me market price, order of magnitude," or you go to a medical office and you're like, "How much is this procedure?" They're like, "I don't know. We'll bill you." Jesus doesn't do that. The cost is upfront completely. He's saying it's going to take your whole life. Your life is no longer your own, and the idea that you thought your life was your own was actually sinful, and that's how we got here in the first place. And what Jesus here is doing is he's just informing the disciples that I'm Yahweh who has given the 10 commandments, and this right here is just definition of the first commandment. The first commandment is thou shall have no other gods before me.That means you'll not live for anyone more than you love God. It's a matter of reprioritizing. God, you are the greatest treasure of my life. I'm going to live for you completely. Everything in my life is secondary to that. You are God and you alone. He says, "Follow me." And the image of following Jesus is used twice here in the first clause if anyone wants to follow me. And what Jesus is saying is you either denounce self or you denounce Christ. You either denounce self or you denounce God. You can't live for God and yourself in a competing set of priorities. Verse 35, "And whoever would save his life will lose it. And whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospels will save it."It's counterintuitive, but it's true. He's saying that life, eternal life is found, true life, life to the full is found in treading the path of self death, of self-denial. Death is the way to life and the cross, the way of victory. It makes all the sense in the world. If you live for yourself and if you live for pleasure, for comfort, for self-preservation, and then you die. Well, what happens to your soul? Well, for eternity, you are experiencing condemnation. Your soul spends eternity apart from the presence of God. Why would you expect to spend eternity in the presence of God if you rejected his presence in this life? Obviously, if you live for self, you're going to experience ... you're going to lose your life.If you lose your life now and say, "Lord, I don't want to live for myself. That's not going that well. Lord, I want to live for you. I want to follow you. I want eternal life. I want it to begin now." The moment you die, it's just a transition from experiencing eternal life here to eternal life in the presence of God. Counterintuitive as it is the truth of Jesus' words about finding life on the pathway to death has not lacked witness. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn was in the Soviet gulags, as a political prisoner. And there in the gulags, he actually met the Lord. The Lord revealed himself to him. And he often wrote about this, of this experience of self death as a means of getting through whatever sacrifice he had to.He writes this in the gulag. He says, "From the moment you go to prison, you must put your cozy past firmly behind you. At the very threshold, you must say to yourself, my life is over, a little early to be sure, but there's nothing to be done about it. I shall never return to freedom. I'm condemned to die, now or a little later. I no longer have any property whatsoever. For me, those I love have died, and for them I have died. From today on, my body is useless and alien to me. Only my spirit and my conscience remain precious and important to me. And confronted by such a prisoner, the interrogator will tremble. Only the man who has renounced everything can win that victory."In verse 36, Jesus continues for what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? For what can a man give in return for his soul?" And Jesus here is saying that all the wealth of all the world, if you could accumulate all of it, all of that would not be more valuable than one human soul. And each person is confronted with the dramatic choice between death and life, between the world and his or her soul. Is anything worth more than the soul? No. The soul is more precious than all. Psalm 49 verse seven, "Truly no man can ransom another or give to God the price of his life for the ransom of their life as costly and can never suffice, that he should live on forever and never see the pit."Verse 38, "For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the son of man also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father and with the holy angels." There is a tendency both outside and within the Christian community to gloss over the crucifixion, to downplay or take offense at Jesus' crucifixion. Isaiah 52 and 53 alludes repeatedly to the onlooker's shame. They see Christ's suffering. There's a humiliation in that ... we're following him. That's our God, and Jesus says, whoever is ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation. Yes, some of his words are very difficult to receive, especially upon first hearing. Some of these words that define what sin is.Our culture shirks at it. Bristles, there's a visceral reaction. What? No, we understand that the adulterous generation, those that want nothing to do with the Lord would bristle, but what about believers? What about those who take on the name of Christ, who profess themselves to be followers of Christ? And do people do this today or are people Christians, self profess Christians, are they ashamed of the Lord's words? All too often, way too often. I saw a video clip of a sermon that a pastor has given recently and the pastor got up and said, "I think you noticed we skipped a passage of First Corinthians. We read a little bit and then skipped a passage and then continued."And the pastor said, "The reason why we skipped that passage is because, quote-unquote, yikes. That was the answer. We don't want to read the word of God out loud because yikes, because of how it makes us feel. What are you doing? You're being ashamed of the word of God. You're being ashamed of the words of Christ." And Jesus says, whoever is ashamed of me and my works, I will be ashamed of them. It's as if the son of man will be as second coming called as a witness to answer the question, are these people who profess to be yours, are they truly yours? And the answer, no, indeed, I am ashamed that they should take my name on their lips. In Matthew 7:21, the sermon in the mountain, Jesus says, "Not everyone who says to me Lord, Lord will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.""On that day, many will say to me, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and cast out demons in your name and do many mighty works in your name? And then I will declare to them, I never knew you depart from me, you workers of lawlessness." Jesus says when he comes and he will come in the Second Coming, and he will come in the glory of his father and he will come with the angels. The first time he came to inaugurate his kingdom, to establish his kingdom and offer amnesty, offer forgiveness to anyone who would turn from sin and turn to him. The second time he's coming and he's not coming to offer amnesty, he's coming in judgment. For those who are found to be in Christ, that'll be a tremendous day of rejoicing, a day of glory.For those who are found outside of Christ, that will be the worst day in all of eternity for any one of them, any one of you who are not in Christ. So today, friend, if you do not know Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, if you're not sure that he knows you, if you're not sure that you are known by him, today in prayer, as we're singing, as we're praying, respond to the Lord in your heart of hearts and cry out, "Lord Jesus, I'm blind. Help me see. Lord Jesus, I'm lost. Find me. Save me." And he will. He promises to. I'll close with Daniel 7:13 through 14, "I saw in the night visions and behold with the clouds of heaven, there came one like a son of man and he came to the ancient of days and was presented before him. And to him was given dominion and glory in a kingdom that all people's nations and languages should serve him.""His dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away, and his kingdom one that shall not be destroyed." The Lord Jesus Christ offers each one of us grace today. Another touch, another encounter, another touch of healing so that we can sing amazing grace. How sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now am found. Was blind, but now, I see. Let us pray. Lord God, we thank you for the holy scriptures. We thank you Jesus that you were so gracious as to reveal yourself to us. I pray, Lord, if there's anyone here who has not been regenerated, has not been justified, I pray, save them today and put them on the path of following you the path of sanctification.And those of us who are believers, Lord I pray, clarify our sight. Give us a clear vision of who you are and a clear vision of what means to follow you. Lord, if there are areas in our life where we have not denied self, I pray, give us grace to deny self. If there are areas in our life where we have not taken up the cross that you have called us to take up, I pray, give us the grace to do that. And I pray, Lord, that as we follow you, that you give us a boldness, the courage to never be ashamed of your word, never be ashamed of you, but just be daily blown away by incredible mercy that you would choose us before the foundation of the world.That you will write our names in the book of life that you would choose to save us and sanctify us by the power of the Holy Spirit, that you would choose to use us to establish your kingdom. And I pray that you do so, evermore here and beyond. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.

In this episode, I discuss the Apostolic Fathers, St. Ignatius, and what modern Christians are missing.

Content Flesh/Law The Law killed When sin was alive Support our ministry and gain access to hours of seminary videos: https://crosstocrown.org/partners/ Song credit: “Beautiful Day” by Gabe Goodin — https://open.spotify.com/artist/654rVNYWPK6wKQjdJyX3BO My books: Exalted: Putting Jesus in His Place — https://www.amazon.com/Exalted-Putting-Jesus-His-Place/dp/0985118709/ref=tmm_pap_title_0 God's Design for Marriage (Married Edition) — https://www.amazon.com/Gods-Design-Marriage-Married-Amazing/dp/0998786306/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1493422125&sr=1-4&keywords=god%27s+design+for+marriage God's Design for Marriage (Pre-married Edition) — https://www.amazon.com/Gods-Design-Marriage-What-Before/dp/0985118725/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top crosstocrown.org @DougGoodin @CrossToCrown

This episode is brought to you by the letter alphaShould ancient Greece matter to modern Christians? What does Athens have to do with Jerusalem? These are questions that believers have been wrestling with throughout church history. In today's episode as we kick off our new series Ancient Greece, I run down three reasons why I think listeners should stick around for this series and how it will help them grow in their faith and in the understanding of our own modern culture. Website: https://myseminarylife983333216.wordpress.com/?preview_id=3&preview_nonce=2d22b29479Shop: https://my-seminary-life-store.creator-spring.com/Buy Me a Coffee: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/mslpodYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@MySeminaryLifeFacebook & Instagram: @myseminarylifepodGoing Collecting Instagram: @goingcollectingContact: emailseminarylife@gmail.com

This episode is brought to you by the letter alphaShould ancient Greece matter to modern Christians? What does Athens have to do with Jerusalem? These are questions that believers have been wrestling with throughout church history. In today's episode as we kick off our new series Ancient Greece, I run down three reasons why I think listeners should stick around for this series and how it will help them grow in their faith and in the understanding of our own modern culture. Website: https://myseminarylife983333216.wordpress.com/?preview_id=3&preview_nonce=2d22b29479Shop: https://my-seminary-life-store.creator-spring.com/Buy Me a Coffee: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/mslpodYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@MySeminaryLifeFacebook & Instagram: @myseminarylifepodGoing Collecting Instagram: @goingcollectingContact: emailseminarylife@gmail.com

Christian theologian J. I. Packer wrote in his book Keep in Step with the Spirit, “Modern Christians tend to make busyness their religion.” There are church services and Bible studies to attend, Sunday school classes to teach, mission trips to support, and community outreaches to organize. While all of these may be worthy pursuits, they won't bring us any closer to God or make us more like Him.  In today's devotional, Dr. Michael Youssef explains the journey of faith.If you would like more insight into today's devotional topic, listen to Dr. Michael Youssef's sermon Pursuing Godliness in a Godless World, Part 1: LISTEN NOW | WATCH NOW

The enemies of God and the Gospel of Jesus Christ, in the Bible, are the Jews. Modern "Christians" have inverted what the Bible teaches and falsely proclaim Jews as God's chosen people.  This is the opposite of what the Bible teaches. "But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to myriads of [h]angels, 23 to the general assembly and church of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the Judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, 24 and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood, which speaks better than the blood of Abel."  Hebrews 12:22-24 'They answered and said to Him, “Abraham is our father.” Jesus *said to them, “If you are Abraham's children, do the deeds of Abraham. 40 But as it is, you are seeking to kill Me, a man who has told you the truth, which I heard from God; this Abraham did not do. 41 You are doing the deeds of your father.” They said to Him, “We were not born as a result of sexual immorality; we have one Father: God.” 42 Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love Me, for I came forth from God and am here; for I have not even come [n]on My own, but [o]He sent Me. 43 Why do you not understand [p]what I am saying? It is because you cannot listen to My word. 44 You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. Whenever he tells [q]a lie, he speaks from his own nature, because he is a liar and the father of [r]lies. 45 But because I say the truth, you do not believe Me. 46 Which one of you convicts Me of sin? If I speak truth, why do you not believe Me? 47 The one who is of God hears the words of God; for this reason you do not hear them, because you are not of God.” John 8:39-47 "But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. 10 Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy." 1 Peter 2:9-10 "I know about the slander of those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan." Rev 2:9 " Behold, I [a]will make those of the synagogue of Satan, who say that they are Jews and are not, but lie—I will make them come and bow down before your feet, and make them know that I have loved you." Rev 3:9 "But as for these enemies of mine who did not want me to reign over them, bring them here and slaughter them in my presence.'” Luke 19:27 "Who is the liar except the one who denies that Jesus is the [a]Christ? This is the antichrist, the one who denies the Father and the Son." 1 John 2:22 "and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God; this is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming, and now it is already in the world." 1 John 4:3 " . . . as they did from the Jews, 15 who [d]killed both the Lord Jesus and the prophets, and harassed and drove us out; and [they] continue to be highly displeasing to God and [to show themselves] hostile to all people, 16 forbidding us from speaking to the Gentiles (non-Jews) so that they may be saved. So, as always, they fill up [to the brim] the measure of their sins [allotted to them by God]. But [God's] wrath has come upon them at last [completely and forever]." 1 Thes 2:14-16

Prophecies; Listening to the Holy Spirit; Struggling to understand; Humility; Pride bias; Connecting disregarded dots; Strange fire; tav+biet-ayin-resh+vav; "Forced labor" = mem-sumak (4522) = 4522 tribute (corvee); sumak-biet-lamad synonym; Mari tablets; Social Security accounts?; Unpaid forced labor; Bondage of Egypt in Genesis; Taxed labor; Levites belonging to God; Why female goddesses?; Graven images; Rabbit trailing; Ezra-Nehemiah; Exemption to travelling ministers; Rome; Militia; Legionnaires; Practicality; Revealing the biblical message; Know Moses, know Christ; Ten new laws of Ezra?; Setting down your baggage; Kindling fire?; Milk and meat?; Ex 24:4; One-purse treasuries; "Corban" = sacrifice; Wages of unrighteousness; Flesh of the cauldron; Freewill offerings vs forced; Recognizing "dots"; Revelation via Holy Spirit; Stone temples?; Leaven; Reserve funds; Systems of society; Distraction by fear; New laws?; Looking to Pharisees for understanding?; (Graven) Images of Jesus; You are in the bondage of Egypt; Coveting neighbors' things; First fruits offerings; Strong delusion of Modern Christians; Col 3:5; Uniqueness of the Temple; Hiding from truth; Waiting upon the Lord; Gathering together; Hebrew "tax" words; Daniel "walking" = halak: portion of corvee; Dan 4:37; Living stone temple; Keeping His commandment; Iniquity?; Nebuchadnezzar's pride; Following Christ's commands; Correcting misconceptions; Enemies of the truth; Kingdom relationships; Falling to the flesh; Hiding from God; Sharing your light; Burning Bush Festival; Feasts of Israel; Priests to all nations; To whom do you pray for daily bread?; Destructiveness of pride; Realize where you have been wrong.

In 2 Corinthians 4, Paul presents several parallels in the his life: Afflicted, but not crushed; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed. Today, John Snyder is once again joined in the studio by Chuck Baggett as they pick up with 2 Corinthians 4:7 to explore the topic of how these parallels are applicable to every Christian. Modern Christians may not be called to suffer in the same ways Paul did, but God still intends to use our weakness as an indisputable billboard for His power. Want to listen to The Whole Counsel on the go? Subscribe to the podcast on your favorite podcast app: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts You can get The Whole Counsel a day early on the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

Hell is a relic from a fear-based, fire-and-brimstone age, a cruel tool used by church authorities to maintain power and control. So why did Jesus himself mention it so much? Why is he the #1 user of “hell” in the entire Bible? Why was he unembarrassed to talk about fire, darkness, and eternal death? Modern Christians needs to know Christ's answers.

Hell is a relic from a fear-based, fire-and-brimstone age, a cruel tool used by church authorities to maintain power and control. So why did Jesus himself mention it so much? Why is he the #1 user of “hell” in the entire Bible? Why was he unembarrassed to talk about fire, darkness, and eternal death? Modern Christians needs to know Christ's answers.

Today we delve into The Readable Bible, a brand-new illustrative translation that presents the text in modern formats and translates it as we speak today. Our guest is Rod Laughlin, the founder and team leader of The Readable Bible, who shares the inspiration behind the project and how it differs from other versions. The Readable Bible features unique formatting such as family trees for genealogies, tables and charts for numerical data, and outlines for law code. Rod shares how he spent 25 years creating the translation, and how over 100 people have worked with him on this project. We also learn how this version of the Bible is most helpful and what is next for The Readable Bible. Join us as we explore this exciting new approach to the Bible that makes it easier to comprehend and retain. Personally, I wasn't so sure about a new Bible translation, but Rod graciously answered a few thoughts that were spinning in my head as I prepared for this interview. Rod Laughlin became a Christian when he was twenty-eight years old. Desiring to know more about the Bible, he earned an MDiv at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. After serving the Lord as the pastor of two churches and in many other ways for thirty-seven years, he sensed God's call to put the Bible into modern formats. He has spent the last fourteen years leading a team to create The Readable Bible. Over one-hundred people have worked with him on this project. CONNECT WITH ROD: *The Readable Bible: https://amzn.to/3N6MSZ1 https://www.readablebible.com/ CONNECT WITH VICTORIA: EMAIL choose2think@gmail.com ⁠WEBSITE⁠  www.choose2think.co ⁠MENTORING⁠ www.choose2think.co/coaching.html ⁠YOUTUBE⁠ www.youtube.com/channel/UCz8Z2B9TtXvWn0RKelVY5DQ ⁠FACEBOOK⁠ www.facebook.com/groups/choose2think ⁠INSTAGRAM⁠ www.instagram.com/victoriadwalkerlydon/ *⁠CHOOSE 2 THINK DEVOTIONAL⁠ https://amzn.to/3Hcl7v1 *⁠CHOOSE 2 THINK JOURNAL⁠  https://amzn.to/3WvinND *When you click on these Amazon affiliate links, I may earn a teeny commission from qualifying purchases at no extra cost to you. Thank you for your support! DISCLAIMER: The Choose 2 Think Inspirational Podcast is for educational and entertainment purposes only. Please consult your physician or doctor for all medical advice and counsel. --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/victoria-d-lydon/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/victoria-d-lydon/support

Modern Christians lack clarity on the fundamental doctrine of their faith: the Trinity. But why is this the case? Dr. Scott Swain suggests the problem lies in the desire for a Christ who fulfills our expectations. We want Jesus to give a solution to the practical problems in out lives. The doctrine of the Trinity seems abstract and detached from our marriages, careers, and mental health. But what if the doctrine of the Trinity exceeds our expectations? What if we desire too little?  Getting the Trinity right does more than provide a proper theological answer -- it strikes at the heart of the identity of the God we worship. We believe in one God eternally existent in three equally divine persons. From this central belief flow all other doctrines. A failure to grasp this basic theology leads to many modern errors: social trinitarianism, eternal subordination of the Son, and various forms of modalism. Each of these distortions trickles down into our understanding of gender, human nature, and the meaning of authority.  The Trinity reveals to us a God who from eternity past lives in a triune relation of love between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. We must gain Trinitarian fluency in order to speak rightly about him because his glory demands precision and careful meditation. The church fathers defended the Trinity because they saw in this vital doctrine the essence of the Christian faith and the revelation of God in Christ. But this doctrine belongs not only to the theologians of the past, but the everyday faithful Christian in the present who desires to know his or her Lord in a deeper way. Check out this episode with Dr. Scott Swain, one of the foremost Trinitarian theologians in the world, and dive in to the mystery and the glory of the doctrine of the Trinity. Show Notes Dr. Swain's blog Reformed Blogmatics Dr. Swain's Trinity Lectures at the Theology in Practice Conference

To Plato it was an island paradise. To Cicero it was the beginning of the Roman Empire. To Basil it was a name synonymous with luxury. To Augustine it was a place of natural marvels: a mountain that burned perpetually, but was never consumed. To Gregory the Great it was a shrine to his favorite martyrs. Modern Christians know Sicily mostly from the Godfather movies, so they know nothing of its rich Christian history. Till now. Listen up. Links John Julius Norwich, Sicily: An Island at the Crossroads of History https://www.google.com/books/edition/Sicily/UECODQAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=john%20julius%20norwich%2C%20sicily&pg=PP1&printsec=frontcover M.I. Finley, A History of Sicily https://archive.org/details/historyofsicily00finl_0 Mike Aquilina's website https://fathersofthechurch.com Mike Aquilina's books https://catholicbooksdirect.com/writer/mike-aquilina/ Theme music: Gaudeamus (Introit for the Feast of All Saints), sung by Jeff Ostrowski. Courtesy of Corpus Christi Watershed http://www.ccwatershed.org Donate at: http://www.catholicculture.org/donate/audio

Modern Christians are frustrated because they can't force the people around them to bow to the truth of Christian faith or adopt what they see as Christian moral and even political views. Today pastor Fran explores how this is in part due to a misguided idea about how we know the truth of God. This message will renew the place where God inhabits your heart.

Modern Christians are frustrated because they can't force the people around them to bow to the truth of Christian faith or adopt what they see as Christian moral and even political views. Today pastor Fran explores how this is in part due to a misguided idea about how we know the truth of God. This message will renew the place where God inhabits your heart.

This episode is about getting insight into the strategies of our enemies. Mike Winther dives into some of the evil strategies used to hide the truth and deceive the public. We are called to be people of integrity and righteousness. Our strategies, techniques, and everything we do should be above board. We should have ethics and be children of the light. This lecture about defending against public deception was given in June of 2012 in Colorado.   You'll Learn: [01:47] Just because we are children of the light, it doesn't mean the whole world operates that way. Christians sometimes have a hard time discerning, because they don't think people out there are evil. [02:14] Matthew 10:16 talks about sheep in the midst of wolves. [04:40] Modern Christians engage as if we are playing against random moves. We need to realize we are playing chess against a living, breathing, and thinking opponent. [05:14] Our spiritual opponent is Satan. He uses deception to try to make his work seem light. We also have temporal enemies or people with different views who want to direct our family, institutions, and society in a different way than we would like for it to go. [06:52] We should understand the direction of our enemy. [07:58] 1. The centralization of institutions. God prefers to work through decentralization. Satan prefers centralization. [11:56] 2. Dependence. We should really only be dependent on Christ. [13:52] 3. Relativism. Both our spiritual and temporal enemies want to eliminate absolute truth. [14:56] 4. Separation from God and God's word. [16:34] 5. Our enemies want to move away from accountability. God says that we are all accountable. [21:39] Methods of our enemies. [22:08] 1. Inaccurate labels. Improper labeling can be used to advance an agenda. [33:27] 2. Peer influence. We become vulnerable to people who have the same labels as us. We need to evaluate truth and facts from the beginning no matter who we're talking to. [34:35] 3. False leadership. We need to be very careful about leadership. [37:06] 4. The dialectic, a philosophical theory developed by Hegel that describes how societal change happens. [41:40] 5. The action is in the reaction. Sometimes we try to fix something and make it worse. [43:14] 6. Understanding the case and plan. The plan is the policy and the case is the reason. [47:17] 7. Fear. We become irrational when we become afraid. This is a tool used by Satan and our mortal enemies. [49:44] 8. Duplicate of choice. This is where we're given two choices and convinced that those are the only two choices. [57:10] 9. My enemy's enemy is not necessarily my friend. Often we choose someone because they have the same enemy that we do.   Your Resources: Books to browse Five Principles By Michael Winther Tragedy & Hope: A History of the World in Our Time

- Moses continues with his introduction of the Old Testament Laws: - 1. Obey - 2. Don't add or subtract - 3. Remember - 4. Teach the kiddos - Why parents need to be present and involved. - Jenn asks the question, "Should Christians follow the OT laws?" and attempts to answer it.    Click the links below and subscribe:  YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juuZIbmVuLo Website (Subscribe to get 2 free chapters of Out of the Mire)- https://www.p40ministries.com Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/p40ministries  Contact - jenn@p40ministries.com  Books - https://www.amazon.com/Jenn-Kokal/e/B095JCRNHY/ref=aufs_dp_fta_dsk  Merch Store - https://www.p40ministries.com/shop 

Text: Luke 16:19-31 Liturgical Date: Pentecost 16 Proper 21 (C) Calendar Date: September 25, 2022 Location: St. Peter's Lutheran Church, Forestville, WI Preacher: Rev. Dr. Christopher D. Jackson

Author and Church Historian, Dr. Chris Armstrong, joins LAB: The Podcast for a conversation on his book, Medieval Wisdom for Modern Christians. Dr. Armstrong offers an important perspective as we seek to un-cover enchanted reality. Don't miss a great conversation and a chance to hear from a kind and wise guide. 

A new book by Eric Metaxas makes the point that the social and political climate in America today resembles early 20th century Germany. Pastors were not unified and preaching against the concerning actions by the post WWI German government which ultimately led to the rise of Hitler and the Nazi party. Modern Christians are being taught much the same message and facing a similar tyranny. Get Gary's book, Myths, Lies, and Half-Truths

Modern Christians have always struggled with how best to approach Halloween, easily the most pagan, least Christian holiday of the year. Now FBB Speaker Jon Rendall provides readers with a guide to help them think through the issues in preparation for prayerfully finding ways to redeem the devil's holiday for kingdom purposes.

INTRODUCTION As we embark on a new work here in Moscow, we must begin by getting our thinking in line as to how God builds. History is the story of how God built His house. He didn't do a cost/benefit analysis. He built it despite all the conniving of hell & earth. He built it without outside investors. He built it at the cost of His only Begotten Son. And, as we shall see, He's now filled it with fire. THE TEXT Then they that gladly received his word were baptized: and the same day there were added unto them about three thousand souls. And they continued stedfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayers. And fear came upon every soul: and many wonders and signs were done by the apostles. And all that believed were together, and had all things common; And sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need. And they, continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart, Praising God, and having favour with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved (Acts 2:41-47). SUMMARY OF THE TEXT As the miraculous day of Pentecost concluded, the shockwaves were only just beginning. At the end of Peter's sermon a multitude (3000 to be precise) gladly received his word and were baptized (v41); this is a callback to the first “Pentecost,” when 3000 Israelite idolaters were cut down after the Golden Calf debacle (Ex. 32:28). The early church is described in its corporate worship as being steadfast in the Apostles' teaching––the basis for their fellowship––breaking the bread, and prayers (v42). The remarkable signs & wonders continued––fulfilling the prophetic word in Joel 2:19, 30––and great awe came upon every soul (v43). Their corporate worship, daily in the temple, spilled over into the rest of life. The Believers were marked by generosity without compulsion, which manifested in a particular care for the host of sojourners in Jerusalem (vs.44-45). Not only did they gather daily in the temple, but also from house to house. The fellowship which they enjoyed through the Apostles' doctrine spilled over into a joyful singularity of heart (v46), and faithful praise to God. The fruit of their faithful diligence in formal & informal worship & fellowship was favor amongst the people. This, in turn, produced rapid growth (v47). THE GOD WHO SCATTERS The day of Pentecost is unmistakably mirroring the ancient events which took place at the Tower of Babel. Babel was man's attempt to climb into heaven to obtain a name for himself. Whereas God had tasked Adam & Eve to fill the world with His glory & name. The project of Babel was to find a unifying principle for the universe in man apart from God. So God scattered this blasphemous work. He confounded their language, fulfilling their worst fears (Gen. 11:4) of being scattering across the face of the earth. This imagery is picked up later in the warnings to Israel, when the Lord threatens them with being scattered due to covenant breaking. “And the LORD shall scatter you among the nations, and ye shall be left few in number among the heathen, whither the LORD shall lead you (Deu. 4:27).” Israel was also to be God's means of frustrating and scattering the city of man, which we see in their battle hymn, “And it came to pass, when the ark set forward, that Moses said, Rise up, LORD, and let thine enemies be scattered; and let them that hate thee flee before thee (Num 10:35).” When man sets out to build apart from God, and in rivalry to God, God will scatter him. The Hebrew word used for “scatter” means dashing a vessel into a million shattered pieces. When man sets himself in rivalry to God the end result isn't unity, it's all the unity of a tornado in a trailer park. If Israel, the household of God, abandoned God and sought to build the kingdom apart from their Covenant King, the result would be what we find in the book of Acts: an Israel scattered to the four winds. GATHERED TOGETHER IN CHRIST The nations which are represented at Pentecost echoes the Table of Nations in Genesis 10. These Seventy nations had been scattered and frustrated in their opposition to God's redemptive purposes. Now, however, these scattered nations, represented by Jews from the Diaspora, are gathered together as one by the mighty work of the Spirit. Peter warned the Pentecost crowd to flee from this wicked generation (Acts 2:40), referring to unbelieving Israel, which itself had become a new Babel, of sorts. The Lord Jehovah who'd descended upon Altars, and the Tabernacle/Temple as a flaming fire (Cf. Gen. 15:17, Lev. 9:24, Jdg. 13:20, 1 Kg. 18:38,  1Ch 21:26, 2Ch 7:1ff), now sent His Spirit to dwell in a house of people; even people from all nations. What marked these early Christians as a result of the Spirit's working? Fidelity to the Gospel as taught by the Apostles, fellowship, breaking the bread, prayers both spoken and sung, hospitality, glad simplicity, and praise to God. This was (and is) the secret sauce to church growth. Modern Christians think they can build the kingdom of God by using the bricks of Babel. We see it in the way evangelical leaders capitulate to the talking points of godless politicians. We see it in the way worship services are turned into entertainment events. We see it in how the plain Word of the Gospel is dulled and blunted in order to nuzzle into the same space as Oprah, Dr. Phil, and the self-care counselors on TikTok. We see it in the way we ignore the plain command to show hospitality, considering it an inconvenience to our personal schedule and possessions. But God gathers people into His house by the faithful preaching of the scandal of the Gospel. The house of Israel crucified Jesus, the promised Messiah, the rejected cornerstone. But God wasn't thwarted in His purpose. That same Jesus was now exalted to be the true & eternal King of Israel. His first act was to accompany the preaching of His Kingdom with the power of the Spirit to enable His citizens to joyfully obey their King. FILLED UP TO WORK OUT The Spirit was poured out, and the people weren't idle. Just as the Spirit equipped the ancient saints with skill to build the tabernacle, the Spirit now fills His people to build a temple of people. People in whom God pleases to dwell. The Spirit's outpouring became a flood of good works: fellowship, praise, covenant faithfulness, hospitality, and simplicity of heart. So, what is the work that God has set in front of you to do? The progression of our text makes one thing plain, the Apostles' doctrine was inseparable from the practice of the saints. The Word went forth, and the people lived out the Word. The works of righteousness followed the Word of the Righteous One. Nothing, in principle, has been altered since that day of Pentecost. The description of the early church is what the true church is & always shall be defined by. Pentecost displays in vivid detail how God builds. God builds by scattering the proud and their vain imaginations. Then, just because He can, He gathers up the humble as a house of people. God then filled that house with fire. The Spirit's fire equips the saints with His presence, the presence of the Almighty. Thus we're enabled to minister in His house. God's household isn't a silent, empty cathedral; it's full of the bustle & hum of joyful saints busy with sacred work. And what is that work? Our first duty is to believe the Apostles' teaching: God has made Jesus, whom the House of Israel crucified, both Lord & Christ (Acts. 2:36). Secondly, we faithfully worship. Third, we throw the best parties.

Christians are called to love their enemies. But can they also... kill them? Is there ever a righteous time to fight back? Or should we "turn the other cheek"? Let's discuss Christian Pacifism!

Grace welcomes Dr. Chris Armstrong to the podcast to talk about his book, Medieval Wisdom for Modern Christians, and think through medieval Christian humanism's influence on C.S. Lewis, and how some of these medieval ideas might help think more creatively and faithfully about community, faith, and history today. Dr. Chris R Armstrong is an educator, academic entrepreneur, author, editor, and church historian (Duke Ph.D., Gordon-Conwell M.A.). He currently serves as Program Fellow in Faith, Work, and Economics for the Kern Family Foundation (WI). He taught from 2004 to 2013 at Bethel Seminary (MN). From 2014 to 2018 he served as faculty member and founding director of the Opus faith & vocation initiative at Wheaton College (IL). His Medieval Wisdom for Modern Christians: Finding Authentic Faith in a Forgotten Age with C S Lewis (Brazos, 2016) retrieves the Christian humanism of the Middle Ages. Chris serves as Senior Editor of Christian History magazine (www.christianhistorymagazine.org) and blogs at gratefultothedead.com. He enjoys playing tabletop games with friends, listening to jazz, and improving his jazz piano skills.

Episode Summary: Jesus commanded us not to be preoccupied with what we will eat or drink or distracted by what we are going to wear. Rather, we are to seek first the kingdom of God. But how do you seek something you can't describe and don't know how to define? Modern Christians are not the only ones confused about what this means. Dr. Luke tells us that Jesus spent his last forty days on earth explaining this concept to his disciples, and they still got it wrong, asking “Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” But Jesus' teachings about the kingdom of God are puzzle pieces that do fit together and can make a huge difference in understanding our mission. This episode puts some of those pieces together and illustrates how Christ-followers have sought and prayed for the kingdom of God to advance over the earth. For Further Prayerful Thought:What is the most helpful thing you have ever learned about the term kingdom of God?Do you agree or disagree with the argument that Christians fail to understand what it means to seek first the kingdom of God because they don't go back to Adam and Eve's original creation as rulers of kingdom earth and calling to spread shape culture FOR the High King?How does understanding the ALREADY/NOT YET aspects of the kingdom help you understand it. What is still confusing to you?What examples of kingdom discipleship stood out most to you?Feedback to the Host: Pease feel free to contact me at gyagel@forgingbonds.org with push back, questions about resources, other resources or additional ideas about how to help Christ's men better be equipped for their mission.This Week's Past Series Highlight: Surrounding Our Loved Ones With the Belt of TruthKids and the SCIENCE DISPROVES GOD Argument S1 E #48 10/4/20Answering HOW COULD A GOOD GOD ALLOW SUFFERING? S1 E #49 10/11/20Answering THERE CAN'T BE JUST ONE TRUE RELIGION S1 E #50 10/18/20Answering YOU CAN'T TAKE THE BIBLE LITERALLY S1 E #51 10/25/20Shaping Culture In a World That Jesus Said Hates You S 1 E  #52 11/1/20For the printed version of this message click here.For a summary of topics addressed by podcast series, click here.For FREE downloadable studies on men's issues click here. 

MODERN CHRISTIANS have been taught that the supernatural enemy of God is just “the devil”—and many of us don't believe he's real. This week, we discuss four of the major figures leading the forces opposed to God: Satan (the storm-god Jupiter/Zeus/Baal), Apollyon (Saturn/Kronos/El), Leviathan (the Antichrist), and Mystery Babylon (Ishtar/Inanna).

Modern Christians are stuck in the midst of a false dilemma, pretending to wrestle with the question of how God created the world. On one side the evolutionists revive the ancient, atomist philosophy of the Epicureans in the name of "science". On the other, Christians who have been in the same school of philosophy as the evolutionists falsely interpret the Scriptures, reading into them ideas that St. Augustine warned would come. In this talk, Mr. William C. Michael discusses what's wrong with BOTH Evolution AND "Creation Science". Join us for real classical Catholic studies in the Classical Liberal Arts Academy: https://classicalliberalarts.com. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/williamcmichael/support

The virtuous pagans were known for their lives which modeled the four "classical" virtues of Temperance, Justice, Fortitude and Prudence. This, however, is not the virtue of the Christian life. Modern Christians, failing to attain to the classical virtues pretend to have Christian virtues instead, but this is a lie, since "Faith without works is useless.". In this talk, we meditate on the Christian virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity and see how they cause a Christian's life to surpass the standards of the virtuous pagans. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/williamcmichael/support

Dig in with Finn as he discusses the lessons that Modern Christians can learn from the story of the first two kids in the Bible!

When struggling with the loss of a loved one, it is sometimes more helpful to turn to poetry than to philosophy for answers and for consolation. Alfred, Lord Tennyson, the greatest and most representative poet of the British Victorian Age, struggled mightily with the problem of pain in an epic poem that he wrote as a way of dealing with his grief over the sudden death of his closest friend, Arthur Hallam. But his poem, In Memoriam, does more than wrestle with the loss of a friend; it wrestles with the societal loss of a traditional Christian worldview. Twenty years before Darwin's Origin of Species, Tennyson wrestled with the theory of evolution and all that that theory implies about the nature of God, man, and the universe. Although Tennyson, unaware of the modern cosmological, paleontological, and bio-chemical challenges to Darwinism, leans toward theistic evolution, and although he comes dangerously close to endorsing a fully subjectivized faith, his raw, honest grappling with pain and suffering and his yearning for a transcendent God make him a worthy co-wrestler for the modern Christian.This Postmodern Realities episode is a conversation with Journal author Louis Markos about his online-exclusive article, “Tennyson on Theodicy: How a Victorian Poet Can Help Modern Christians Deal with the Problem of Pain.” https://www.equip.org/article/tennyson-on-theodicy-how-a-victorian-poet-can-help-modern-christians-deal-with-the-problem-of-pain/Please note this article will be fully accessible by the public in the future, to get early access to read it now, please see our FAQ section on Early Access to Online-Exclusive Articles by clicking here. https://www.equip.org/early-access-to-online-exclusive-articles-faqs/ Coming soon! Check back here and at our article archive page. We'd also like to invite you to subscribe to the Journal. To subscribe to the Journal, please click here. https://www.equip.org/product/crj-subscription/When you to subscribe to the Journal, you join the team of print subscribers whose paid subscriptions help provide the resources at equip.org that minister to people worldwide. These resources include our ever growing database of over 1,500 articles, as well as our free Postmodern Realities podcast. Another way you can support our online articles is by leaving us a tip. A tip is just a small amount, like $3, $5, or $10 which is the cost for some of a latte, lunch out, or coffee drink. To leave a tip, click here https://www.equip.org/product/pmr-jnl-tip/Other articles and Postmodern Realities podcasts featuring this author: Postmodern Realities Episode 171 Why Christians Should Read the Pagan ClassicsWhy Christians Should Read the Pagan ClassicsHank Unplugged: How to Explain Hell with Louis MarkosHow Dante's Inferno Can Help Explain Hell to Modern SeekersHank Unplugged: Atheism on Trial with Dr. Louis MarkosC. S. Lewis on HellThe Legacy of G.K. Chesterton and Dorothy SayersDon't miss an episode; please subscribe to the Postmodern Realities podcast wherever you get your favorite podcasts. Please help spread the word about Postmodern Realities by giving us a rating and review when you subscribe to the podcast. The more ratings and reviews we have, the more new listeners can discover our content.

Chris Gehrz and Sam Mulberry talk about the good things that Christianity before the Reformation has to offer.

David Grubbs interviews Chris Armstrong about his recent book "Medieval Wisdom for Modern Christians."